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 10th – This looks like some pretty revolting flotsam and jetsam, but it’s actually an important and encouraging sign of spring.
These knobbly, odd looking root growths are the rhizomes of the water lilies so common here on the local canals in high summer, and this is the first stage of their… seasonal deployment.
When the season ends, water lilies decay, and the stalk and root mass they grow from sinks to the canal bottom where the excess growth rots off and the stalks over winter in the mud where the water stays warmer, fragmenting as they do so.
When the waters warm in spring, renewed cell growth in the fragmented stocks gives buoyancy once more and they rise to the surface, moving freely in the wind currents and boat wash.
In time, new growth will sprout and they anchor, growing the familiar leaves and flowers we know so well.
It’s a wonderful, and very successful natural mechanism, and a sign of an oncoming summer…
April 7th – An awful, terrible horrible day in which little went to plan and I just gradually lost the will to try. A spin out in light drizzle late wasn’t so bad though, and did make me feel a little better.
As I headed up the canal towards Newtown, I realised that things are greening up well – the fields of Sandhills and Hammerwich are bright green, but have had little chance to shine as yet.
The mist and murk would ordinarily have been depressing, but for the fresh air, solitude and speed I was grateful.
Life can be tough sometimes.
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 5th – I keep going on about this to the point that readers must be sick to death of it, but Spring seems alternately on my shoulders and miles away.
Stood on Catshill Junction Bridge, looking at the leafless trees, muddy wet towpaths and general lack of green, spring seems delayed.
We need warm weather, clear skies and all this will just bolt into life.
It ain’t too much to ask, is it? A bit of happiness from the sun?
April 4th – A quick run across Kings Hill Park to B&Q reminded me that although the day was grey and damp, spring was getting on with the job anyway.
A hint of sunshine and this place will be an absolute riot of colour.
Gorgeous as it is, but some warm sun and happiness would really make this fabulous… I hope the weather gods are listening!
March 30th – A day of rest, with a journey up to Tesco in the late afternoon. The rain seems to be settled upon us for the weekend, which is a bit of a blow, but the forecast clearly isn’t as bad as many had predicted with a return to snow and ice.
I guess I should stop moaning, really; at this time in 2013 there was still lying snow around and it was very cold. And we are more prone to white eEasters than white Christmases in this country. But it feels like I’m missing out.
In Brownhills, the waterfowl didn’t seem to mind. One swan partner of the nesting pair just up around the bend was idling, and came over, hoping for food, and was grumpy when none was forthcoming. The Canada geese, however, were just loafing, and paid me little heed. We stood for a while together, just listening to the rain on the water.
There had better be a decent summer after this…
March 27th – And in Darlaston, near the Black Country Route, the hawthorn is coming into leaf, splattering formerly dull, barren hedgerows with bursts of vivid emerald green.
Spring really is trying her very hardest to please us.
March 26th – My goodness I’m having trouble keeping up with this this week, apologies – have no fear, normal service will be resumed forthwith!
Spring is coming to the hedgerows, edgelands and waysides, almost in spite of the lousy weather generally. Although we’re having some good days, mostly the weather is still grey and cold, and Winter is beginning to feel like the unwanted, hated guest that will never leave.
Nature is doing it’s very best to push winter away – the daffodils are well on the way now, with the large beds on roadsides starting to come out, and to my surprise, ornamental prime blossom on a trading estate in Telford.
There’s brightness, as there always is. But you have to look for it. Hard.
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