I’m usually pretty calm about the vagaries of the weather; like being stuck in a traffic jam there’s nothing you can do about it and getting hot and bothered and thumping the steering wheel only gets you a sore hand and no further on (I freely admit to swearing at other motorists but that’s different).
This year’s been different though, for the first time since we’ve been in France I’ve been getting depressed over the sheer unrelenting greyness of it all. One of the things we’ve always been able to rely on is that though the weather can be pretty extreme here, torrential rain, extreme cold or heat, sudden fierce gales, after a day or two or a week the skies clear, everything is a brilliant blue and even when the actual temperature is zero you can feel warmth on your face from the sun.
Not for the last three months. It’s rained and rained and rained, sometimes torrentially, sometimes lightly, sometimes as smirr – that mist which isn’t quite wet enough to be called rain but still leaves your hair soaking, and even when it hasn’t rained the skies have usually been lowering and overcast. The ground is completely sodden, it quakes like a bog when you walk on it and we can’t go on most of the usual dog walks because going up hills is a no no as the ground is too slippery. The compost bucket under the sink remains unemptied for days as I’m not prepared to wreck my shoes by letting them sink half way into the ground as I cross the lawn to the composter and my boots are always at the other end of the house when I think of it. Worrying about mud on the floors or mud smears on the long windows where dogs and cats scratch with filthy feet to indicate they want to come is the path to a nervous breakdown – though to be honest as I don’t eat off the floor a bit of mud has never worried me.
Three days ago the sun came out, and yes it rained a bit the next day but the sun came back. The ground still squeaks when you walk on it but I don’t have to wear a coat or a scarf or rainwear when I take the dogs out, they say that the smells have suddenly got really interesting now they aren’t been rained away continuously.
And the grues – cranes – have started flying back to northern Europe from their winter grounds in Spain. We’re on one of the main flight paths here and no matter how many flights have gone over the sound of the distant honking as they communicate with each other always pulls us out into the garden to squint up at the sky to see where there’s a V shaped line of birds flying steadily towards Germany. There’s something about their cries which lifts the spirits immediately, in the autumn it’s a sign that the seasons are rightly changing, now, especially after the last two dismal months, it’s a harbinger of better things to come. We hope.
I was at the market yesterday when a huge flight, hundred of birds, went right over Cadillac. All around the market, Frenchmen and women, of the type who normally only look at a bird to work out how to cook it, were looking upwards with huge smiles on their faces.
Yup, there’s something about grues.
I love this – it has been depressing hasn’t it. I woke to a blue sky this morning. I can’t remember the last one. I really don’t believe it has been this grey for such a long uninterrupted duration in years. Thank heavens for the grues. I haven’t seen any yet but a friend with a garden said things were starting to grow, and my long neglected window box is just showing my chives, which always reminds me of potato salad and balmy summers. Roll on!
You’re right! I’ve just been out to check my chives – growing wild on the path outside the sitting room which isn’t tidy but they’re too pretty and useful to grub up – and there are two or three clumps already.
Having been welded to my computer writing for the last three months I haven’t noticed the weather that much. But have seen fast flowing rivers that were once valleys, and vast new lakes once crop fields. Never seen anything like it in 17 years. But today the weather has been simply glorious. Haven’t seen any grues yet, can’t wait, You are right, it’s such a wonderful sight and always makes me cry.
We drove back from England 10 days ago and all the rivers from the Charente northwards were over their banks. We spent 7 years living 50 m from the edge of the Garonne which is why we now live on the top of a hill, The tension of constaantly watching the river and wondering if today was the day it was going to come into the garden was too much.
I thank goodness we moved to a land of earthquakes….the weather in Europe has been bizarre for a few yearsnow and this year’s non stop rain would have given me the habdabs…at least here it comes when expected.
We weren’t on the regular crane route…but occasionally would see a small off course group overhead….and once saw one, solitary bird in the water meadow along the road.
We’re lucky enough to be on a major flight path and there’s a spot very close which must have excellent thermals for it seems to be grue central for they all head there and mill about, gaining height, before heading off again.
It has been horribly depressing. The past few days have been like a tonic. We love our rare glimpses of flights of cranes. It’s not one of their major flightpaths here but we see at least a couple of flights per season. The noise is unearthly.
I had the roof down on the car today – first time for months! OK, it was a little chilly but worth it!
A sign of optimism if the birds are on the move I guess. There’s something about the habits and paths of birds, I am amazed at how much I enjoyed reading Kathleen Jamie’s attempt at writing about peregrines, cranes and other birdlife, sometimes its just the thing to cope with winter hibernation, when one can’t drag oneself out. Now I’m ensconced in Elizabeth von Armin’s Elizabeth and her German Garden for much the same reason. Delightfully eccentric.
I was so surprised when we moved here to discover how many birds there were about, popular wisdom has it that they’ve all been shot by hunters but far from it.
I’ve never read Elizabeth and her German Garden but I did read The Caravannerss which was hilarious.