Silent bliss

After a hard day's editing, cooking and keeping on top of kitchen mess, we had supper and a couple of glasses of wine.  I then, finally got to go into the garden.  It has rained all day virtually, and so it was damp, slightly fragrant and covered with snails.  But it was just bliss somehow to see all the different leaves opening and the flowers gradually emerging.  The incredible sense of potential never ceases to amaze me, and it makes me feel full of potential too.  There is something so perfect about this time of year - the quince tree has more buds on it than ever this year, the apple leaves are coming out bright green ahead of the blossom.  The best tulips are still to come, there are buds on all the rose bushes, and the winter flowering shrubs all have excellent bright new leaves; the honeysuckle leaves are hiding buds.  It's just lovely, and quiet - just a couple of seagulls flying over, calling each other.  It makes me feel as if I am in love.  Sadly not.  Perhaps that's the fate of the second half of life - the feeling of love gets attached to the inanimate, given the lack of suitable human material.

I should perhaps say it was more like the feeling I had as a child - seeing a flower and sensing the Ideal that lay behind it... one wants to see plants simultaneously in bud and in flower... the potential and the fulfillment. It made me feel extraordinarily happy.