Joy in the natural world

'Peewit or plover'

'Hares galore'

'The april-showers that fortunately missed me!

On my bike!

It has taken me a long time to get my bike out of the cellar, but this year not due to fear –

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2011/03/fear_8580.html

It was the cold weather that put me off this year, and tiredness. I must be getting soft in my old age!

We still seemed to be in deep winter during the chilly days before I set off to England, with even some snow still fluttering down now and then. It was not at all the sort of weather to put me in the mood for a forty-minute ride to work.

As soon as I returned to Germany in mid-April I brought one neglected bike out of the darkness of the cellar and spruced it up for spring and prepared it for long journeys. Then I wrapped it up and waited for a bit of warmth in the air!

Watching the weather

Day-by-day I watched the thermometer before I decided what to wear. Early each morning I asked myself whether it would it be my nice clothes and a hop on the tram or my cycling gear and a hop on the bike?

It was not until Friday 27th, almost the end of April, that I took the plunge. The temperature rose from three degrees on Tuesday morning to twenty-three on Friday, so off I peddled. 

It was lovely to feel the air on my face and watch the countryside fly past. Even in the city, where I cycled down streets that I have not travelled since December, there were many changes to be seen.

I doubt that the temperature will stay in the mid-twenties for long but I think that the frosty mornings may now be behind us. This will probably be the last month in which I spend money on the expensive ticket for the public transport system, until I dig deep in my pocket again next December.

Watching nature

The trams and buses have been very busy over the past few weeks, some days on the return trip being full to bursting. It was therefore a real treat on Friday to be out in the fresh air communing with nature.

I love the extra time that I get to read when I travel on public transport, but I think that I enjoy even more the time spent communing with nature on my bike.

It is not only nature that excites me, I also enjoy all the action at the airport where I love to stop to watch the aircraft taking off and landing just above my head. I love to dream of being up there. I sometimes think about making a spontaneous decision to jump on a flight that would take me home for the day instead of to work!

I have not done it yet. Instead, as I did on Friday, I watch the herons fly to their fishing grounds, smell the spring in the hedgerows, hear the peewit or plover in the still short cornfield with the skylarks twittering above. At dusk I will stop in silence, as I did this week, in hope of catching the hares in action. Observing a spring boxing-match is a treat yet to come.

But does it change the brain?

Arriving at work with ten kilometres behind me by bike I do feel much wider awake than when I travel the distance by bus and tram. I wonder whether the clients would be able to tell. We shall have to put it to the test next week.

Cycling certainly does change my outlook on the day, my personality is transformed, and my soul is awakened when I commune with nature instead of with the inside of a tram or a bus.

PS

It took me the same length of time to cycle the distance as it did four months ago. The rest seems to have done me no harm at all and the bike seemed to manage it alright too.

Notes

More on the spring start to cycling – 

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2011/03/influence-of-weather-on-well-being-of.html

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2010/03/minus-four-still-no-sign-of-my-bike.html

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2009/04/story-of-red-and-yellow-tricycle.html

Back home to roost

'The old nest...'

'...and the new.'

The arrival of more than just warm weather!

Last weekend I dragged my lonely and neglected bicycle up from the cellar, pumped up the tyres and hung it up in the Hof behind the house. I was expecting to jump on it for the first time this year the following morning so that I could enjoy the ten kilometres to work in the fresh air instead of on a crowded tram and bus. 

I did not jump on the bike until Thursday because the temperature at seven in the morning was still not much above zero. 

Am I really turning into a fair-weather cyclist after all these years of riding come-wind and come-weather?

On Thursday the wind changed and with it came high temperatures, over twenty degrees higher than on Monday morning. So not only did I get on my bike (more about this later) but I also got out on the balcony. 

While I was out there tidying up the winter’s debris I heard a familiar cooing. 

Home to roost

When I returned from my visit to England a couple of weeks ago the first thing that I had done, when I walked in the door at nearly midnight, was to check whether my balcony guest had returned. The old nest was still empty and looking untended but there were tell-tale signs on the ground below that someone had been about.

It was not until two days ago when the warm weather enticed me to sit outside with my coffee, and later with my lunch, that I heard that soft cooing again. It was coming from just above my head. 

Last year’s guests certainly had returned and much earlier than in 2011. There, just two metres away, I spied that beady-eye looking at me again. This year I was being observed from a couple of branches higher, actually in the neighbouring tree.

I still have a perfect view of the nest

I can see the male or the female bird (it is impossible to tell the difference) sitting there eyeing me up, but at a distance that makes me able to use my balcony without disturbing Mr and Mrs Collared Dove. 

It really was a lovely experience last year observing that bird family at such close quarters, witnessing the arrival of the baby-bird, watching it fledge and seeing the rate at which it grew, but it is better all round that the family decided to move house. I am, however, very grateful to them for remaining within viewing distance. I know what is going on from past experience so just seeing that they are they is enough to give me a bit of company without my disturbing them when I tend my geraniums and strawberries.

Welcome home!

Notes

2011’s seven birdy-bulletins – 

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2011/06/squatters-rights.html

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2011/06/bird-report-number-two.html

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2011/06/in-new-zealand-2004-normal-0-21-false.html

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2011/06/company.html

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2011/06/5th-birdie-bulletin.html

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2011/07/birdy-bulletin-number-five-home-and_10.html

http://www.susie-mallett.org/2011/07/last-birdie-bulletin.html

Scritch-scratch

Snow is in the air

I was sitting at the drawing-desk writing the previous posting when I heard scritch-scratch, scratch-scritch. 

When I hear this noise I always hear it in double-pack!  I hear the actual noise and I hear it whispered in my ear in Mum’s voice.

The spoken words are a memory from Beatrix Potter’s Mr Mcgregor who, with his glasses placed on his long nose, was busy working in his garden as Peter Rabbit made a dive for safety under the gate. 

I loved this story but it made my sister cry. Mum read it to us anyway and she always whispered the scritch-scratching!

As I heard the scritch-scratch for real at midday today I wondered for several minutes what it could be. A familiar sound that I could not place it at first.

It was strange that it took me so long to remember what the noise is because last night I had told a friend that there was a familiar smell in the air, I said that I thought we would wake up in the morning in Nürnberg to a white-world.

The world was not white when I woke but it is now!

The scritch-scratch was the snow shovels out on the pavements doing the first clearing before grit could be sprinkled.

It is that dirty, slushy snow that must be cleared and salted before the evening temperatures drop low enough to freeze it thus making the pavements treacherous.

With the first scritch-scratching of the winter I will now have the extra alarm clock, that is a sign for me on snowy mornings to get out of bed a bit earlier so that, despite the weather, I can get to work on time.

Out with the sledges at last!

As the children left us on Friday evening I wished them a happy and snowy weekend. They will be thrilled to be outside on their sledges. The wetness of the snow does not deter their fun.

Notes

Beatrix Potter – The Tale of Peter Rabbit 

http://www.tonightsbedtimestory.com/the-tale-of-peter-rabbit-beatrix-potter/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbhxAm8t0JQ&feature=related

Who painted the sky this morning?

Pink sky in the morning shepherd's warning!

Sometimes it is really nice to have to be at work before eight

Today was one of those days. I would not have missed this sky for the world, it looked just as if I had been out there, up a ladder with my paint-box.

As for the pink-sky-in-the-morning warning, it is not something that rings true here like it does in Norfolk, there was a clear, sunny sky all afternoon.

The influence of the weather on the well-being of body and soul

"Bike in December"
Hong Kong

I nearly got my bike out!

Well, I thought about it seriously but I am glad in the end that I left it cosily where it has been since the end of November.

I resisted the urge because although the sun was shining and the cycle-path busier than it has been all winter, when I got to the tram terminus I noticed that the temperature was well below zero. That is still a bit cold for my aching bones.

I used not to be a fair- weather cyclist

When I lived just ten minutes from work I used my bike everyday whatever the weather. There was never the time to get really cold on that trip but now with a thirty-five to forty-five minute journey, depending on traffic lights and my energy levels, there is plenty of time to get frozen right through to the bones when the temperature hits minus twenty! Especially those bones in the knees and fingers!

Now I am counting the days until my stroke group starts their next block. It is not that I am wishing away my life, or that I am not enjoying my current work, or that I am just longing to be doing my favourite work again?

No, my longing for my favourite group is because the stroke group starts later in the morning. I can leave home after eight, by which time the sun could have warmed the air a little and melted the frost and icy puddles just enough for me to be brave and get on my bike!

I have found the last two winters just too cold to cycle but now just as this time last year my body is crying out for fresh air, exercise and a good night’s sleep that come with the reappearance of my trusty bike.

So, maybe at the weekend I will drag the bike up the narrow, white-washed cellar steps, pump up the tyres and have a whirl around the block to check whether I remember how.

Weather and our body and soul

While writing this I am wondering about the influence that the weather has on all of us and how, even during this new cold spell, we are all feeling just a little bit brighter because the sun has been shining and the skies have been vibrant. But there is still no warmth in the early morning rays.

The weather influences us all both physically and psychologically, I think we are all aware of that. But it has a greater influence when we are ill or if we are experiencing physical difficulties.

I remember when there were still metal pins in my healing wrist, that I almost screamed because of the pain that shot through my arm at the moment I went outside when it was below minus ten!

Clients’ weather-related discomfort

Most of my clients speak to me at some point about their symptoms and their well-being in relation to the weather.

The stroke clients often mention how the changes in the weather influence the severity of their symptoms and their feeling of well-being. The spasticity in their limbs, they explain, is much more difficult to relax on days when the weather is changing from crisp and cold to muggy and damp. Or when there are sudden changes in temperature from hot to cold. Humidity and the period of change seem to influence them more than the actual temperature does.

The hot summer temperatures have a greater influence on the feelings of well-being of the MS clients than the stroke clients, as do the freezing arctic conditions of winter.

Clients with multiple sclerosis generally tend to bundle themselves up against the cold, keep themselves in a warm atmosphere as much as they can in the winter months. In hot summer months when the temperatures rise above thirty-five degrees they have to do the opposite in order to maintain an adequate level of energy to go about daily life. Much in the same way as some clients cannot take hot baths for fear of draining their energies and increasing the symptoms that they have, when the summer weather is too hot they remain in the shade.

Many take holidays in the season that has the most negative influences on their health, visiting countries with a climate that best suits their needs.

Of course I should not generalise too much about my clients. We are all different and some clients do not mention any change in symptoms that may be related to the weather. However, my years of experience have shown me that the weather has an influence on many people, including myself. It causes some clients to suffer from worsening symptoms, others are more or less able to influence these symptoms, and some have more or less energy or feel more or less well as the weather changes.

What about the children?

Children too are influenced by the weather but they speak about it less directly. This week one boy told me that he felt really happy because in the hour between school and Petö he had played in the garden with his brother, the blue skies and the sun warmed their souls if not their bodies on that day. I was informed by him that indeed the sun is getting warmer. It probably is at lunch-time but not when I would be getting on my bike!

However much the cold affects the spasticity in the limbs of children most of them who are active enough, or clothed well enough to keep warm, cannot wait to get outside to make snow angels and snowmen. I think the children notice the psychological benefits of the weather more than they notice anything else, and much more than we adults do.

My bike is still in the cellar where it will remain until the morning temperatures hit zero but since the children informed me of the warmth in the midday rays I have been sneaking outside to the bench at lunchtime, armed with a blanket and a steaming cup of tea, to soak some of them up.

Roll on springtime.

Time for staying indoors

"Look out! Danger of avalanches from the rooftops!"

"So I stayed safe and sound indoors all weekend while the snow melted"

"I got out a present that my Dad gave me months ago"

"Just perfect for a damp, grey, in-danger-of-avalanches weekend"

"Those steps were tricky but fitted a treat!"

"The doors were fiddly"

"The chimney-pots even fiddlier!"

"And the train arrived on time"

"The taxi was waiting"

"All done"

Almost-completely-back-to-normal Monday

Kindergarten began last week, and this week sees the beginning of a new school term, busy roads and all my colleagues back at work.

Here in Germany if Christmas and New Year land at a weekend, as they did this year, then there is the least chaos possible for a holiday time, and self-employed people like me can go to work without too much disruption, if they wish.

In Germany we do not get extra bank holidays to compensate for Sunday's being Boxing Day, so Monday 27^th December to 31^st was a normal working week. The following week was almost normal too, although there are some areas, including Bavaria where I live, that get given the 6^th of January as a bank holiday too.

So, to cut a long story short, although I have not had two weeks holiday since the beginning of January I have had less work than I usually do, therefore life in general has been quiet and relatively peaceful.

White holidays

The weather has been perfect for children on school holidays, the snow that fell while I was in Hong Kong and also on the day that I should have returned to Nürnberg, stayed put for skiing, sledging. Sometimes, when it was the right sort of snow, as my “Petö” children call it, for snowman-building too. Christmas Eve saw another flurry that made everywhere perfectly white again, for a Sing-along-a-Bing!

The big thaw

On the one of the two days that I had to go to work at the end of last week the big thaw set in, making roads slippery with slush, and the pavements dirty with grit and the remnants of New Year’s fireworks.

Walking along the streets in the city you took your life in your hands.

I had spent the sunny but cold days before the thaw photographing the splendid display of icicles, that now looked very precarious!

I decided to steer clear

I stayed indoors for three days in the warm, doing nice things. Actually most of the time I spent occupied with just one nice thing. I was making buildings with just a bit of blogging in between!

I opened up the sturdy, green envelope that held the present that my Dad had bought for me when we visited a model railway exhibition in Norwich early in 2010.

It was about time that it got sorted!

And sorted it is, as you can see in the photographs above. i now have a rather magnificant station build on my coffee table just about where the Christmas tree stood.

The snow has gone, for all but a few patches of ice, and the road sweepers began their worktoday to clean up all that grit. It is safe to be out on the streets again, which is a good thing, as school started today.

I also found another unmade and forgotten building in the modelling kit box. A country station this time, just perfect for the two old blokes sitting on a bench, the lady and gent with walking sticks, and a even older lady with a zimmer frame that I had bought in Paderborn last summer.

This building is now waiting to be contructed on the next grey, damp, stay-at-home weekend. I expect there will be several more of them before this winter is over ,when I can relax once again while fiddling with a building, with its tiny chimney pots and glass windows.

I cannot wait for the bad weather!

The wrong type of snow

The holiday is not over yet.

Lots of time still to discuss the Congress with my German colleagues.

We are stuck in Amsterdam but decided to leave the cold railway station behind us and have booked into a hotel. Off to celebrate one of the crowd's birthday now.

More later!

Rain in Hong Kong

"Brollies from above" 16th December 2010, Hong Kong

Sorry that the pictures are playing up. I will turn them when I get to a big computer!

Smiling at the moon

"The man in the moon is singing"

21 October, 2010, 18.00 MET

"Then the bus arrived"

Walking home after a nice day at work

Sometimes it is good to be too tired to cycle, especially when my camera is in my pocket and my notebook is close at hand. Below is what I wrote while standing in the middle of a field, and above you can see what was in the camera.

As the pictures show it has suddenly got very cold, snow has been forecast, in fact on higher ground the first sprinkling of white dust can be seen.

From my notebook

"Twilight is lovely, an amazing violet sky. To the east a full moon is rising fast in a perfected graded pastel sky and behind me to the west a red ball of sun is fading in a sky criss-crossed with vapour trails. Very cold."

From home

An hour after I had written my notes about the dusky sky, I received a message from home, England, that told me:

“Sky is a wash of pale orange and duck-egg green. Very nippy.

PS

The reason that I put up so many pictures of the huge, rising moon is because I was so surprised at the speed at which it was moving as I stood waiting for the bus. I had never realised before that the moon comes up so quickly. It was appearing just as quickly in front of me as the sun was disappearing behind me. I was really glad that I had left the bike at home.