England In May

In this article, in The Daily Telegraph, earlier this month, about getting in training for RideLondon, Boris Johnson wrote that "There is nowhere more beautiful than England in May" with the tulips out and the "hawthorn blossom lying like gunsmoke across the battlefield; the sun soft, everything surging and budding with spring." I might not go quite so far as to say that nowhere is more beautiful than England in May, but when the sun shines, the English countryside or an English garden is indeed a good place to be. Yesterday the sun was soft and, although most of the tulips are over, everything was "surging and budding with spring". Today it is raining and damp and grey again, but one can't have everything.

Like many bloggers, I find myself drawn to taking (and posting) pictures of the seasons and the natural beauty inherent in the changing landscape around me. Recently I have found myself a bit reluctant to add my rather amateur photographic offerings to the many, very beautiful and very professional-looking photos out there, on the grounds that I can't add anything of which you won't find other, and better, versions elsewhere.

My reluctance has been compounded by going through an archive of old family photographs which my best friend had acquired and finding that the only ones that really held our attention were ones of identifiable people. Photographs of landscapes and gardens, flowers and mountains, without the added detail of someone we knew, either personally or by extension, we flipped through without much interest, despite some of them being beautiful images in their own right; photographs of family and friends however, even those now long dead, we pored over, delightedly peering through the windows they gave onto family history and life lived.

Thinking about this, added to my feeling that my posting pictures of landscapes and flowers etc on here might be interesting for me, but possibly not for anyone else much. And this raises the interesting and complex question not of John Donne's "For whom does the bell toll?" but "For whom does the blogger blog?". I've noticed quite a number of bloggers talk about their blogs as places for recording memories for the blogger themselves as much as for anyone else. Looking back through blog archives is clearly a way of remembering and savouring moments that have given delight - a way of reliving good times and happy moments after their passing. Blogs aren't exactly diaries but there's an overlap in places.

Of course lots of the pics posted in blogland give delight to others too, but the point I'm making is that even if they didn't, the posting of them remains important, perhaps even essential, for bloggers themselves. And although I think one of the most important and special aspects of blogging is the possibility of connection with others, there is also a place for blogging that preserves connections with ourselves and the days of our lives that we thread together, like beads on a string; sometimes in deliberate patterns and ordered arrangements; often haphazardly and accidentally and which, whether we like it or not, make up the history of our identity. And part of life's essential survival kit, I think, is remaining interested in that.

So today I am simply going to post some pics I took yesterday afternoon without demur. You may, or may not, find they interest you. There are lots of better pics of England in May out there and there's nothing special about mine, but I am putting them here because if I don't, I will forget the moments of memory they carry for me of a May afternoon in the sunshine. Not big moments, or any kind of dramatic events, but moments that lift my spirits to remember today and perhaps in unknown tomorrows when I want to hang on to the today that will be then be a long-gone yesterday.

And I can't say I won't repeat the exercise from time to time, so feel free to skim through and move on when I do, like I and my BF did, going through that fifty-year-old archive. Normal service will be resumed shortly!

All of these pics, apart from the last, were snapped while walking along a track about 200 yards from home. The apple blossom is in my own garden - the tree is absolutely covered in flowers, as if it is making up for the lack of fruit last year and promising two years' worth of fruit in one.

PS Please would Caroline Saunders and MagsD get in touch with their addresses for their giveaway bags? I haven't heard from you and your bags are waiting to be sent off to you, if you still want them. You may have changed your mind of course, which is fine, but I don't want to send them elsewhere if you are still interested. Let me know by the end of this week (31/5/13) if you still want one. 

E x