Squirrely

There was a noticeable drop in temperature today, but was nothing to complain about as the sun continued to shine.

As we came to this morning this cheeky squirrel was undertaking a raid on the bird seed shortly before the parent’s dog was let out and went barrelling towards the squirrel. As ever, the squirrel was able to make its escape and besides, I’m not sure that the dog would know what to do with it were it ever successful in the hunt!

The parents had an errand to run, so m’boy was off for a car ride and got to scratch his car obsession itch with a trip to a local supercar dealer stocking a bunch of Lamborghinis and Aston Martins, which blew him away. On a walk this afternoon, he was further blown away when a Maclaren rumbled past followed by a fancy Mercedes going the other way on the return leg. 

The Youngest was happy to spend some time with me being pushed to alarming heights on the swing. 

A nice family walk over the fields in the afternoon yielded a sighting of some deer before the children were back in the inflatable hot tub for playing and vomiting up the water they’d accidentally drunk.

I had a social engagement with my new/old friend Maria. We calculated that it must have been at least 35 years since we’d seen each other last and had only started speaking again towards the back end of last year when she contacted me on Facebook (one of the nicer, more positive sides of the site). Her family were neighbours and good friends of my parents when I was a baby and look after me when my mother was going through a very tough time. 

We walked and talked for a couple of hours – intermittently eating some Haribo she’d gifted me – catching up about memories from that time and all sorts of other stuff. To be honest, she is so softly spoken and has this wonderful, enviable sense of calm about her, that I could have listened to her talk for hours. However, being very happily married to a lovely, handsome chap and with an equally handsome son, it was only right and proper to return Maria to her boys at some point! I also needed to return to my offspring who were at that moment both a) in dire need of a bath and b) running rings around their grandparents. 

We are repeatedly reminded of the importance of being present and living in the moment and whilst I don’t disagree with this, I think sometimes it is also important to revisit the past as it can be a nice reminder of where you came from.