True Friends

True friends, like ivy and the wall 
Both stand together, and together fall.

Thomas Carlyle


Despite having very heavy hearts and not feeling very energetic, we managed to go out for a walk this afternoon. I was delighted to hear so much bird song around me, more than I've heard for a very long time, which felt like another gentle hug from God. 
 
This old wall is a fragment that is remaining from the estate of a large mansion which stood nearby, and which was demolished at the beginning of the 20th century. I took this photo for my blip, but I am resorting to plagiary for the actual journal entry.

My husband and I subscribe to daily emails during Lent from Brian Draper, a Christian who is a journalist, a contributor to Radio 4’s "Thought for the Day" and also author of two wonderful books: "Soulfulness" and "Soulful Nature: A spiritual field guide". 

Forgive me for quoting Brian here instead of writing my own journal entry. I’m finding it really hard to put my thoughts and feelings into words, and find Brian’s gentle eloquence really helpful. I hope you will too. 

"In troubled times, we can end up living more in our head than our body, and our minds can go into overdrive. So it helps to earth ourselves with simple physical practices.

"It’s the poet Edward Thomas’ birthday today, and in his 1914 book In Pursuit of Spring, he describes his experience walking in a wood after a downpour, in which the birdsong sounds to him as he imagines it might have on the first day of Creation: ‘I found myself repeating with an inexplicable fervour the words, “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end, Amen.” 

"Thomas was not a Christian, per se, and a sometimes troubled soul, which makes his response that much more moving."