Nature

The day after I found out about Norma I was quite sad and Ian suggested that we stopped working and went for a walk around the land. I was particularly keen to see what had happened to the orchid field. We were quite a bit later than last year, when they were spectacular, but then it has been a long winter and a late spring so everything is a little later this year. This year the rain has meant that the grass has grown up a lot more but although past their prime, we still had an impressive array of pyramid orchids in bloom, along with a host of other wild flowers.

This was taken from the bottom of the field looking up towards the house. There were one or two bee orchids but these were really finished. Our plans at the moment are to leave the field as it is but maybe just to top the grass after the orchids have died back. We also saw lots of butterflies. My favourites were four really pretty black, white and grey ones, which reminded me of Norma. I have always liked the idea that the butterfly is associated with the soul and to me this is more meaningful than symbolic burials or cremations. So when I saw these butterflies floating around over the fields and flowers I though of Norma, free at last from the things that tied her down. Unfortunately they were flitting around too quickly for me to take a photo!

Grieving for a pet is different to grieving about a person. I was sad for a day, less sad the day after and now, apart from getting used to needing one less cat bowl my life goes on as before. With a person the pain lasts longer and is stronger.

When I showed people some pictures of the house after the last visit they asked me if the sky was always blue. Well, it isn't I'm afraid. The weather was quite changeable and we had some spectacular grey skies!