Criminal Damage

Some may have happened to notice I have featured one of the outstanding personalities of our village in my Blips of the last few days.

Today I thought I ought to show his handwork.

On the left the stream about 10cm deep, that runs about 200m alongside our property. Our hedge is full of trees and shrubs which provide us with a welcome windbreak from cold easterly winter winds, is a halfway effective sight barrier and perhaps a slight noise damper from the relatively busy road but of course a haven for wild birds who love all the very different types of nesting places and the variety of food from the various berries that grow in the course of the year. There are lots of soft evergreens but also loads of prickly, intertwined bushes that give them a safe haven.

The white stuff in the stream top right is not plastic but slurry foam from the runoff after "fertilising" the fields and perhaps getting a tad too close to the stream. Like Uber self-drive cars, sometimes big Fendt tractor GPS systems don't work 100%.

My friend cannot stand this scene and he has been at war for 16 years. He cannot accept that the erosion on his side (the field) is caused by the stream trying to find it's original bed after it was straightened 50 years ago, that our bank doesn't erode because it is firmly anchored by all the tree and bush roots, that the countless moles and mice in his field are constantly at work and that his "biggest-of-all-farm-machines-in-the-village" that cut the field at record-breaking intervals and slew slurry into the stream after each cut are more likely the cause. The field is just part of the entire area that is notoriously wet all year around.

(Last year, my friend got so frustrated that he sold the field to the parish council but being as greedy as he is, rented it back at no doubt very low annual cost, claiming the ground quality was so low. )

So he took it upon himself to cut down the two bushes on our side of the bank next to the horse stables and left two gaping holes. One of the bushes indeed needing cutting back and we had agreed we would do it. We would have simply removed the branches hanging in the stream. But he couldn't wait and cut them both down to the ground.

I initially thought he had at least disposed of the branches somewhere legally but no. In typical arrogant, above the law manner, he threw the pile on a remote part of our property which he in his wisdom considered fit for the purpose. The bottom right photo shows the pile. It's about 3m x 3m x 2m and gives some idea of what damage he did.

Easter is coming, I am sure there is something in the Bible about turning the other cheek and forgiveness and the meek shall inherit ......

Tomorrow is "Gründonnerstag" (green Thursday) or in English Christian religion Maundy Thursday, The Washing of the Feet, The Last Supper and all that. So I will follow his words:
"Mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos"
("I give you a new commandment, That ye love one another as I have loved you")

My Blip journal will shortly return to its normal scheduled boring service.