April 16th – One thing that has been extraordinary this year is the show from the daffodils. They’ve been out for weeks and are still going strong, and in this morning’s sunshine made even the dull industrial estates of the Black Country beautiful.
Tag: commute
April 16th – What a difference a bit of sun and warmth has made.
Cycling to work on a sunny, pleasant Monday morning, the trees and shrubs of the Goscote Valley Cycleway were all of a sudden bursting into life.
An it’s very welcome. So green, So fresh.
April 13th – I rode to work in steady rain heavy hearted. It’s not often I say this but the morning had no redeeming features I could find; it was wet, cold and very, very unlike spring. 2013 was a pretty bad spring, starting very late with heavy snows in the dying days of March like this one. But at least the sun came out and things dramatically improved. 2018 has tested even my usually stoical resolve, I must say.
Rolling through Kings Hill on an errand mid morning, everything was headache-grey – the roads, the buildings, the sky.
It’s rare I feel so bleak about the weather.
April 12th – Victoria Park in Darlaston was looking moody and dramatic as I passed back through, and I still adore the mystic bridge.
This park isn’t doing so well for the flowers this year, sadly; the old cutting is usually a riot but there was hardly anything, mainly I think to over-enthusiastic grass cutting.
Sad really. Darlaston does have some excellent parks and open spaces.
April 12th – another wet, grey and frankly unlovely day. Where is the sun? The warmth on my back? The neighbourhood cats I’m normally welcoming back on warm evenings as I cruise jacket less through the suburbia of Walsall?
I watch, I wait, I plough on in the murk and damp.
Meanwhile, the damp, raindrop bejewelled Kings Hill Park continues to entertain with a variety of flows and planty of spring promise.
Soon. It’ll be soon. You’ll see.
April 11th – Over in Telford on a misty grey and damp morning, crossing the motorway on the cycleway bridge I noticed that the blackthorn blossom was in full swing.
One of the earlier tree blossoms of spring, it’s usually a pointer to better weather. Often mistaken for hawthorn, it turns hedgerows and copses white for a time, but before the leaves are fully out.
It shows it’s real beauty on a sunny day. Ah well, better luck next time.
April 9th – on a verge on the same estate, these cheerful souls need no introduction.
With a bold sun burning up the mist, their perfection was inspiring, beautiful and a lovely boost in my day.
Such a lovely thing to see.
April 9th – I’ve been passing this rather beautiful white shrub for a week or more now and have absolutely no idea what it is. It’s growing in a clump of cotoneaster in an industrial estate flower bed in Wednesbury.
In the damp beauty of a misty morning it was absolutely gorgeous. Anyone know what it is?
April 6th – Dipping into Stonnall and the backlanes on an errand on the way home, spring is indeed in the lanes: The first bees are dozy, but about and feeding. Spring flowers are decorous here as well as Telford, and a pheasant pranced in a field, it’s gorgeous golden plumage sparking in the weak sun.
We’re getting there, slowly.
April 6th – A frenetic, hurried visit to Telford in the afternoon showed me something about spring I forget – the optimism and resilience of nature. At the worksite of the new footbridge project, daffodils I spoke of as being lost last year under diggers and demolition have not just survived, but sprout from every patch of undisturbed ground. Bobbing cheerfully from scraped embankments, mounds of silver and defiantly decorating piles of rebar, these yellow flag bearers for better times will not be put off.
Meanwhile, steelwork is going up apace now.
Some features of spring are not just beautiful, but life-affirming.
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