OCTOBER- the season of Acorns, Cobnuts and Conkers
With the autumn sun now at a lower angle in the sky, Maverick and I lead our longer shadows over harvest fields now ploughed and forsaken. The sky began to break like an ice cap, where cracks in the laden clouds widen to crevices of weightless blue. All around the leaves of the hazel amongst the hedgerows took on the golden-green of spring in the beams of the low autumn sun.
As we halted by the little stream that drifts in hollows of silence, a colder waft brought the diegetic sound effects of a slow trinkling. This area was awash with our tallest annual which grows as tall as a man. The Malaysian balsam was brought here from the Himalayan foothills in the year 1899, their sappy stalks crunch loudly on the path where a vapour passed revealing a cloud of antiseptic odour, their blossoms alive with bees buzzing a sweet tune.
Sweeping low in gentle flight was Cuthbert the friendly crow, where the quinity of things here are countable and uncountable, but something this way comes and strikes Maverick’s eye. He huffs in tones scarcely audible where several grey squirrels came from dew-bedecked brambles to harvest the fallen cobnuts. With a few hops orderly they left the earth into the silhouetted woods with sinuous ease. With swift of foot, Maverick gave chase, and I am replete with delight.
As we enter the wood and amble by the little stream, the muffled wind moves over the surface of the water and plashes colourless in reflection. Many old trees are covered in ivy which acts as an entomological service station in Autumn. Amongst the trees a little owl was flying back and forth in bounding flight, catching insects, a stocky little bird, catholic in his taste. I love to watch him bobbing up and down in the quaint antics of his kind. His kiew, kiew call is far reaching, I find him so encouraging, I name him Barnabas, my favourite of Jesus’s disciples who also embodied encouragement. Here there is beauty all around, the autumn leaves are red, green and gold and the deep red peggles of the hawthorn are shining brightly.
Here is where wood pigeons are gorging themselves on nature’s rich bounty of acorns and it always surprises me how they can still take to the air after consuming so many. The horse chestnuts too have fallen after the warm winds, their empty shells scattered across the ground, where the shiny red-brown skins of the conkers delight the eye and are eagerly collected by excited children, their eyes a sparkle at the beautiful sight.
Now Maverick and I turn our unchartered course back towards home as the weather purports to be overwhelming with strong hellacious winds. A portly man spitting with anger and extreme disrespect was visited upon me. My eyes came to light upon him as he raised his bottle of wine aloft like a communion priest. He speaks foolishly at tedious length with brag and bluster, his face showed the sombre countenance of his appearance with his constant berating, a storm bringer you may say. Some people it would seem want you to have senseless conversation with them and still expect you to agree. I believe the trajectory path of his chosen way of life limits his friendships. I tell him to turn his wounds into wisdom, for when we are feeling low, we must try to find a way to look beyond these temporary illusions. To focus on the grand vision of life, as these feelings are what feed and nourish us, but I fear my words are rejected and count for nothing. I believe he may be the architect of his own demise.
However, the compass in my brain that knows no charted field swiftly swings in, with stealthy pace Maverick and I take our distance to seek shelter from the oncoming storm. We must now make our way home after our daily dose of wisdom. It’s not what you look at, it’s what you see when you look. The stream, the clouds, the birds and the tiny insects in the pond, even the smell of the coming storm. For living a life like this, I believe to be a very acceptable form of living.
