A freezing fog, from the previous evening was slow to clear so it was late when I set off to walk George. This done I visited the church at Lockington where I walked George again. We passed through the graveyard, making a slight detour, to where I saw some wonderful, fresh flowers marking the spot of a recent burial. I stopped and spent a moment there, birds calling noisily, moved through the beech tree behind me, as suddenly the grey day was illuminated by bright sun breaking through the mist. The flowers glowed in the light, as if to say "thank you for stopping". After this, we walked a little more then back at the car I had a coffee and sandwich. George, now satisfied, rested as I drove off through Lockington. The cold, hazy, grey mistiness of the day seemed all powerful until the sun returned, briefly as I drove away. Just past the Bracken road junction I noticed this field, the remains of straw stubble brightly reflected in the sun, also a tree stood alone in a hedge. I quickly stopped and set up to paint. The temperature was only 2 degrees C and I needed several layers to keep warm, including, for the first time, my specialist, custom made, double ended, fingerless ...hmmmn....what are they? I'm going to call them 'glittons'. I can report back that they made all the difference, though are now covered in paint...( only joking ). As I worked, a couple of Lockington residents who were walking along the quiet road, stopped for a brief chat. We talked of people we knew and how things hereabouts have changed over the years, many people have moved on and, I suppose, businesses being closed. I finished the painting and remembered I still had some coffee left in my flask which was very welcome. In the distance, a wind hover looked down a long, winter fading, grass verge. The feint, muffled noises of shooting reminded me that a couple of days earlier, I had seen beaters with their red flags, wearing waxed jackets and flat caps, emerge from a footpath spilling onto the quiet country lane. Just as I finished a pair of pheasants appeared in the distant stubble.... I smiled wishing them well.
Driving away a minor drama was being run. A blackbird flew across the road into a hawthorn hedge quickly followed by a low flying missile, twisting and turning, only a couple of feet above ground level, homing in on it's prey. This was a stub winged sparrowhawk, such an agile, powerful flyer. It bullied a path through the thin branches and out of sight....I could not see if it was successful or not, but regardless considered that life for birds at this time is tough, lack of food and cold weather meaning only the strongest survive.
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