Looking Beyond the Bluebells.

The wood at the top of the lane is rampant with bluebells at the moment. I’ve never seen them so prolific – courtesy of a mild winter, I suppose. And I was trying to work out earlier what makes bluebells growing in a wood so special.

The ones growing on the verges and in the gardens are attractive enough, but it’s the ones growing among trees that delight the mind with a sense that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. It’s as though the scene is a canvas, beyond which – if only it could be breached – lies a subtler form of reality. And ever since I was a child I’ve harboured the suspicion that such a form of reality is the source from which the human mind derives its appreciation of aesthetics.

*  *  *

Meanwhile, nothing funny happened today, which is a shame. Except, maybe, watching the new lambs gambolling. Their back legs are still a bit too long for their bodies, which makes their let’s jump up and down and kick our legs out so the predators will think we’re too fit to be worth chasing game a source of mild amusement.