All this ...

...and Heaven too! But I'm getting ahead of myself. I can't believe we escaped so much of what that storm whose name I keep forgetting brought in the way of misery and hardship to people in the south, but before I get to the beautiful afternoon that I've featured in my photo I have to start with the first event of the day which was my suddenly finding out, as I idly flicked through Facebook while eating my toast that the water for the whole of the area was going off for an unspecified period because engineers had to work on some fault at the filtration plant at Loch Eck. I was quite proud of the speed with which I leapt to fill kettle, litre jug, soup pot and my water bottle - but really to have the water go off while one is trying to get out to church is ... trying. The spirit of 1947 (I know there were standpipes in the street then, and I was only a toddler, but still ...) meant that in the hall I had stashed a huge plastic bottle (5 litres? More?) full of water that had been there for years, so we were able to wash hands and teeth (but not dishes),and were at least clean when we left the house. Of course there was no water at the church as well, so no coffee afterwards, but we still hung around blethering nonetheless. 

There was still nothing coming from the tap when we got home, but I was able to make coffee for us and Di, and by the time we were done it was back and all was well. We had a fairly rapid lunch and managed to get out before the sun had set - just - and headed south to watch it vanish behind Bute.

The photo  above was taken from the farm road, sufficiently far up to have a fairly panoramic view over the grazing sheep and the hundreds - and I mean hundreds - of Canada Geese in the fields, all facing in the same direction, all pecking away at the grass, with the occasional squawk interrupting the continual quiet burbling sound. As it grew darker and the sky turned redder before the clouds all vanished into the dark blue of the sky, we could see the moon, now half-way full, and Venus appeared bright to the south of us. There was a curlew somewhere, and  every now and then a sudden flight of birds, black against the sky, flying purposely towards Bute. 

By the time we reached the car it was almost dark, but there was still a surreal light from the sky as if on a stage set for night-time. And I thought, as I often do, that some people go their whole lives without experiencing the kind of aching joy that such an evening brings - and it's only fifteen minutes from our house. So yes, all this and heaven too!