We’re all passing through…

I woke this morning with an earworm, so, being a kind-hearted soul, I thought I’d share it with you. It’s an old country song by Charlie Landsborough, and, as usual with country music, it’s not the most cheerful you can find. There’s a very good reason why Zander in Xuffy the Vampire Slayer called it the music of pain, and yet it’s not, as far as I can work it out. It’s acknowledging that life has good times and bad times and that people come through on the other side. Anyway, here it is

"We're all passin through

Do unto others as you'd have done to you

Do what you can

Your fellow man is travelin too

We're all passin through."

And here’s a link to the song, in case you’d like to hear it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7Gzzqp5ZSk

So why, I hear you thinking, is she wittering on? Firstly, because I am fed up with the human world at the moment, so I’m watching the birds more instead, and learning so much.

Specifically, that my beloved Harbourside, where my fellow walkers and dog walkers and what we call the pootling cyclists rather than the racing ones are kind and stop to talk. It’s odd that we all know each other by dog names and descriptions. I’m proud to be ‘mum and photographer’ because my daughter is really getting into wildlife photography as part of her course and I’m getting even more into watching them.

Our swallows have left, but another batch has arrived to stop off for a while en route to North Africa, and they’re another of the birds that would make any acrobatic flying display team give up because they can’t equal them. People say a lot about hawks and birds of prey, and they’re right because the ospreys and sea eagles are beautiful, but the way the swallows swoop and soar and love the vibrations from the sluice rebuilding works that keep the insects on the move is amazing to watch. They’re so beautiful in an austere sort of way, and they move so fast that this is another of those times when I can’t show you a picture. I can show you the cormorants, because they’re arriving for the winter and I love the way they have to hold their wings out to dry. I mean, how does evolution work to give you a diving bird that has to drip dry?

Did you know that ducks migrate too? I always thought there were more in Poole Park in the winter, and now I know why! Most of all for me, though, are still the starlings, because, and bear with me as I go slushy again, they’re nicer to be with than a lot of people.

Daughter is managing her photography by taking a tub of bird food with her, and these creatures aren’t daft. Oh no, they so aren’t daft. They’ve worked out that she, like me, is an unabashed softy, so the first starling to arrive is always SW as we’ve christened him, which is short for Slightly Wonky, because he has one malformed foot. In the human race, all too often he’d have been driven out, but he’s one of the leaders of the chattering, as they call a group of starlings on the ground. So, daughter feeds him lavishly and he hops up on the bench and chats to her as if it doesn’t matter that she doesn’t know what he’s saying any more than he understands her. And now I come to think about it, it doesn't. He makes her happy. She makes him happy. Other people are happy when they watch them. Isn't that a lot more than enough?

And here’s the thing that made me laugh. The seagulls have caught on, so we now also have a one-legged herring gull and a black headed gull leading their flocks to join in the ‘hi, I’m cute, photogenic and hungry.’ We’re getting through a fair bit of bird food, but that’s okay, because she’s getting great pictures and we decided this summer that instead of having ice cream or coffee on our walks as a treat, we’d put the money aside for buying bird food. Better for us, better for the birds and being there and watching them is better for my soul because I can feel myself coming unknotted when I'm down there and watching the sea and the birds.

The wildlife photographer and TV presenter Simon King once described getting out onto the Somerset Levels that he loves as much as I love Harbourside as getting back to the real world. Add to that the fact that green and blue space are known to have health benefits, including increased socialisation and physical and mental health and no wonder this is my special place. When I’m there, not only am I getting the exercise I need to keep mobile, even if some days I am slooow, but things come unravelled in my head and I plot and plan and make notes and then get back to work.

Speaking of which, and before the cormorant picture, here are this week's special offers and 99p in the UK and 99c in the US.

Bloody Murder, Devil to Pay and the Missing Maiden all come from my Christians Cross rural fantasy series. Well, if you can have urban fantasy, why can’t you have a village that stands on a portal between our world and a lot of other ones? Why can’t you have a virtuous vampire, a werecat, the Archangel Michael as a vicar, and a cop who’s a reluctant believer in the paranormal but has a nose for it, because one of his ancestors was a witch hunter? It’s not doing his relationship with his little sister much good because she’s an emerging witch. And then there’s the pub, run by the mostly good nixie, who’s a river spirit. Once, she was given tribute. Now she only eats people who really deserve it. Add to that the village shop that has everything you need or want as long as you don’t annoy the grey-ish witch who runs it and it’s a cosy’ish place… Just watch out for the gremlins because they have a way with duvets, alarm clocks and blenders and you don't want to attract their attention. They love traffic lights too.

More conventionally, there are two books from my Amy Hammond series. They are Perfect Home and the End of the beginning, and they’re both set during Covid, and doesn’t that seem a long time ago now? Unless, of course, you’re immunocompromised, suppressed like I am, so have given up crowded places forever.

Last but not least, two anthologies, one from Amy Hammond and the other from Windy Bay. Go on, three books for 99p. How can that not be a bargain? They’re She didn’t mean to find trouble and Love by the Sea.

So see you on Sunday, and until then, here’s a cormorant dripping dry. I’m assuming you don’t have to iron them!