Dear reader...

AT LAST THE countryside is warming up, the early summer sun a delight to see as it glances across the fields and woods first thing in the morning. It is all too easy to think summer doesn’t arrive until mid June, and miss these lovely May evenings. This year, though, I am determined to make the most of this part of the season. Whether it is just cutting the grass, going for a walk across the fields, or watching the aerial acrobatics of the swifts and swallows, I shall be outdoors as often as the weather allows. The problem is that I get home from work, head out with a cup of tea for a quiet half hour, then spot something that needs doing. Next thing you know, two hours have passed, the tea is cold, and you have barely skimmed the surface of the tasks to be done. I think the secret is to relax and make mental lists of what needs doing, while refraining from actually doing it. Perhaps I should designate certain evenings each week for leisure and others for work. Of course, it is almost bound to rain on the leisure evenings. But once it stops, there is that lovely fresh feeling to the air. Water drops sit on petals, birds take the opportunity for an impromptu bath in a puddle, before feasting on a fresh hatch of midges that rise like a cloud of smoke into the sky. Then, if I wait long enough, the bats come out, hunting down their prey. Silence predominates, broken only by the munching of the cows in the field behind. It is time to go in.