Spring

Easter Monday in the UK is a holiday - so my partner and I decide to go walking in and around Ayot St Lawrence in Hetfordshire. George Bernard Shaws home at Shaws Corner and Catherine Parr's (one of Henry VIII's six wives) tudor mansion are duly inspected and enjoyed. The weather is quixotic - one moment sun, one moment cloud then showers so I joke and grumble on making up lymericks and ditties on the vaguaries of English spring weather.

We cross a large wheatfield as huge polka dots of sunshine rush overhead, the light just missing us every time. I stomp and mutter after them saying "Where's my little piece of Spring?"

Suddely we are trapped dead centre in a beam of sunlight, white-bright and eye-squinting. My girlfriend turns to me and says... "Of course it's spring, listen..."

In the space vacated by my mythering I can hear birds calls, scurrying, rustling and a gentle breeze on the fields. I've been too busy making my own noise to hear what's going on around me.

She says "Let's listen to the peace and quiet for a while..." and we walk on arm in arm surrounded by the world waking up.

Hyp