Something About This Time Of Year...........

An East Lothian Sunset

Hullo ma wee blog,

There's something special about this time of year. Lots of bloggers have mentioned it this week. Weather changes, temperature cools, light softens, days get shorter as seasons slowly turn. Summer's morphosis into Autumn is on the way and this morning leaves are being buffeted by wind and rain. The grass at the front of the house is strewn with windfall pears which the birds are gorging themselves on. At the back of the house the swallows, who have nested under the eaves for the first time this year, are efficiently feeding the second brood of the season in preparation for the all too soon departure to warmer climes.

The land around is a brown and green patchwork of fields that have been shorn or are waiting the attention of the harvesters that slow morning traffic on country roads. Fields seem full to bursting point with bales of hay. Harvested fields are industriously ploughed by farmers eager to sow the next crop. Fields of potatoes grow strongly in the red East Lothian soil and evening roads reverberate to the sound of tractors and lorries loaded with hay-bales being moved to storage. Livestock too seems to dominate areas as huge numbers of sheep and cattle graze on fields of lush grass.

For me it's a time of naive reassurance. The garden fruit trees have been groaning with the weight of the crop they have grown this year. Heavy branches bend earthwards and early windfalls have been scooped up with relish to be rushed to the kitchen. The glut of apples and pears is upon us and neighbours and family have been warned of imminent arrivals. Link this with the bounty that's evident in the harvest all around and it's easy to ignore thoughts of gobal warming and the sooth-sayers or doom and gloom merchants of agricultural and economic disaster. Surely if the land is capable of producing such huge bounty as this year there can't be too much wrong with the climate? With a summer behind us thankfully free of warnings of water shortages, it's all too easy to put thoughts like those to one side at this time of year. Mother Nature is fecund and ripe. Everything is therefore in balance. Everything's OK. Forget the worries. Time now for many to plan that holiday jetting off to sunny climes for winter sun and cheap booze. Time enough for me simply to enjoy the moment, to savour this all too short period of transition as the seasons continue to turn inexorably through their cycles.

The light in the evenings is superb and my camera is never far from my hand. You can - until today at least - comfortably wear T-shirts right through till night time and thoughts of central heating are still weeks away. Evenings can be enjoyed spent on the patio with a book and a glass of something until light forces us indoors.



It's got to be one of my favourite times of year and I know how fortunate I am to be able to spend it here in this lovely little corner of the world. 'Coastkid',  a local blogger friend who's tales of cycling in this area I follow with interest, is a talented amateur film maker and regularly posts some wonderful GWF's {great wee films} of his treks hereabouts. A couple of days ago he and his helmet camera captured much of the essence of East Lothian in these short weeks with a wee film which happily he's allowed me to post for you here. Drop by his blog or look him up on you tube to catch more of his fabulous GWF's.

See you later.

Listening to Vangelis 'conquest of Paradise'