The Gloaming

I walked from 8pm to 9, down lanes, through fields and woods, all the time marvelling at the sudden spurt that Nature has put on, evident all around me. The barley fields, most beautiful of all crops to my mind, are more than thigh high now where a few days ago they were struggling at calf height. Did old agricultural workers measure the crops thus, using their bodies as yardsticks? I fancy they did. In the breeze the barley waves and dances, the bright green foliage lightening perceptibly by the day and swaying like a tidal ocean. The wheat is a much darker green, a more stolid plant altogether though once it turns golden it takes a lot of beating for its sheer beauty. Elsewhere there's rape, lots of it around Sweffling and Rendham though less here, acres of bright, dazzling yellow though the scent compares poorly with wisteria which it resembles. The wind had dropped, the rain cleared, and the evening was too beguiling to stay indoors and ignore. But alas! My walking shoes, new a few years ago but little worn, let in the water. And by the time I'd fought my way through the dripping chest-high cow parsley that fringes the fields so prettily, I was soaked. Still, it was a joy to be out. These long, bright evenings won't last for many more months, and the thought of what will follow is hard to take. And so I get out when I can, a solitary figure stomping along footpaths carved through fields or skirting their edges, occasionally going off piste when the view looks better elsewhere. Sure, what harm am I doing?