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Our friend was soon on his knees explaining that some violets have
plain spurs, but these delicate beauties had furrowed spurs
I wondered secretly which was the greatest miracle: the
furrowed beauties or the ability of the man to spot them at
fifty yards!
On the way home we were continually calling each others'
attention to the clever way leaves were folded or rolled in
their buds, or proudly reminding each other when we heard
it, that "a little piece of bread and NO cheese" was the song
of the yellow hammer.
SECOND IMPRESSIONS:
With a strength of will never likely to be surpassed, I got
carefully out of the car and stood miserably beside our two
sons, aged 7 and 8 years, while the light breeze immediately
developed into a biting wind. Huddling my aching head as low
as possible into my three woollies and Husband's anorak, I
indulged in a pastime kept up from my childhood and stood
roundly cursing my brother. It was not entirely my brother's
fault that I felt so ill, but if it had not been for his
Christmas present of Y.O.C. membership for the boys, I could
be warm and prostrate at home and not drugged and precariously
upright on a part of the coast that would have seemed like
home to a team of huskies. The boys leapt around me frisky,
energetic and excited, giving me an occasional sympathetic pat
when my moaning became audible.
We were soon surrounded by a party of healthy and vigorous
individuals, who obviously found the freezing conditions
stimulating and not killing and we made our way up to the sea
wall. Standing at the foot of the steps, summoning the courage
to leave its shelter and join the crowd, waiting in the teeth
of the gale at its summit, I felt a fleeting moment of
sympathy for my father's experience of having to go 'over the
top' in the war.
Contrary to expectations, I survived to reach the top of the
sea wall and peered through the migrainous stars and stripes
in my eyes, at a vast expanse of mud stretching for miles into
the gloom and which was covered with hundreds of seagulls.
I was bitterly disappointed. Had we come out here just to show
the children seagulls? I peered around trying to focus on the
faces of the people around us, but at the sight of their happy,
anticipating expressions I shrunk back into my hood and woollies
with that feeling of hopeless isolation only experienced when
being the odd one out in a crowd. I was quite sure I could