"a pessimist is only an optimist with more information"

 

I am beginning to feel like a hermit, the winter draws near and of course it all gets worse rather than better.  Yesterday morning I took a walk round the fields.  Leaving Lucy behind, she would not be able to keep up.  Of course it made me sad, but life has to change even if it is only in infinitesimal ways and she often wakes up with a limp.  I wanted to see if the barn owls were around.

Well as you can see the old barns are still there, no work has been done for the new wedding venue.  The farm itself is always busy now, linked up with the other two farms in Great Edstone,  there is a lot of farm traffic through the village.

The land is rather sad at this time of the year, the leaves on the trees have lost their glow of greenness, already yellowed ones are beginning to tumble.  The barn owl was not to be seen, perhaps winter will bring their cry.  A little batch of long tailed tits have just swept through the garden, their twittering so recognisable.

But the crab apple tree is full once more with fruit turning too yellow.  One good thing has happened in the fields, is new gates with proper easily opened catches.  Heavy gates with complicated locks are the bane of walkers.

And that wicked foreigner - Himalayan Balsam - hangs on in the odd corner, trailing along the river bank, happy in its new found home.

And last of all before I cross the old bridge, the small orchard of apples has a good harvest.  Our apples from the village, and there are plenty of them go to Kirkbymoorside for juicing and the bottles of apple wine sold on.

I sound somewhat sombre, could be because of the music I am playing.  Or it could be that one of my dreams last night was a white-faced Trump, as if he had risen from his coffin to berate us once more with his nonsense.  Here is Suzanne Moore to cheer you up, and also something to remember ;)