This piece is dedicated to the beautiful fields that have been my sanity for 17 years of Chronic Illness and the few before. I have spent many hours just absorbing their beauty. And it is endless. Before I became ill, walking them with my children and then doggo on my time off from work, jumping in puddles, getting muddy and sitting in snow drifts. They were a piece of respite, renewal and refreshments 20 years ago.
If possible, please listen to the piece of music below while you read. Thank you.
This piece of music will always remind me of driving through the countryside on a summer evening with family, windows down, taking in the air as we past glorious yellow corn fields to a formal garden to watch A Midsummer Night’s Dream in the open air.
Local Development
Development of them continues and I am heartbroken. They have made so many difficult years of being confined physically and cognitively, bearable. And I have come to know it and it’s inhabitants so well from my view from my window, back door and when able from the garden.
Nature’s Habitat
The Skylark’s four fields where they have nested for years nearby is now down to one, the closest to our home. How do I know not having left our home for the past nine months? I can see the rooftops moving in. And receive news from my husband and local friends. I fully acknowledge that homes are needed, but there must be some healthy balance.
Voicing Concerns
Having made my concerns known previously, listing the vast array of wildlife in the fields and in the small wood. I am raising my concerns again. Along with requesting more detail of what is expected and for greater ease in the way community can source information. I am hopeful that there is someone of influence of a similar mindset in saving what can still be preserved. I live in hope.
Compelled to Act
I am not giving up, and will do what I can from my duvet. As I’m hopeful many others still are also. If I can get a dog poop bin installed. Ironically at the edge of the field. And this was achieved while stuck in bed. I can try to do something else, and hope to achieve at least something. As nature is yet again under threat. I’m hoping there are other people still interested.
Nature and Our Wellbeing
It is incredibly sad, that during lockdown nature and all its abundance has been a source of respite, peace, renewal, comfort, escape and health for millions of people and their communities. And for many a new and enriching place to explore. As soon as those restrictions ease we begin to destroy it. It seems to me to be pretty short sighted.
As global warming remains high on the agenda, and rightly so, with World Earth Day 2021 recently marked. Brown field sites sit and decay while another green field is ripped up and tarmacked.
As is stated on the Essex Wildlife Trust website. ‘The alternative – that we do nothing – is not an option.’
Please pray that my efforts, which are affected by what capacity the MEcfs will decide I can have, will bare fruit. That my cognitive capacity won’t crash and burn in the process thus disabling my efforts. And that others will feel compelled to help.
Thank you.
Here are my thoughts dedicated to green fields and a wood. Written a few nights ago, while I sobbed.
Ode to a Field
2004 – 2021
Beautiful view you absorbed my pain, gave me hope and a place to dream
Your silence never dull or boring when your afternoon became my morning
The green sea of Barley took me on journeys far beyond my bed or my window
The wood a welcome shadow on a starry night. The moon glowing over the canopy, a feint and gentle light
Mists linger and lift, frosts biting, snow drifting. Welcoming a wind blown bird to my fence to rest
The haze of hot sun
The church bell that echoes across your beautiful peace
The Skylark that sings a joyful song high, high up into the clouds. Soon to nestle in the blades, gently trodden by passing hound
Will they too be gone?
How I long not to say goodbye, as I see the orange diggers clawing and shovelling away your years of tranquility
How I hope and pray some might be left as tears poor down my face. Something left of this our quiet place
You understood my aloneness. My need for peace, to gaze and wander in my mind my body tired and struggling
As the clouds drift slowly across your massive horizon, the rain a beauty seen before its arrival. Oh how I love that peaceful drizzle, falling gently on my face in the breeze at the door my hand held out
I hope as each new foot steps on your beautiful ground that they will feel the intensity of your peace, that which cannot be just be brushed aside and ignored
…will hear the Deer’s light foot, the Owl out hunting, the Rabbit, the Fox. The cubs that called and scurried at night overheard by the Nightingale. All too eerily quiet. Unsure of their fate.
The Heron will continue it’s daily flight across your edges, as always East to West, West to East as it weaves a pattern to the water, followed by the Grebe
Where to the Sparrow Hawk will gaze confused. What has my hunting grounds removed. So too the Swallow and the Swift
The Geese will wonder where they shall rest on their journey south. The Jay will have to dodge rooftops to it’s nesting tree if it remains, the Cuckoo too
Wood Pigeons and Pheasant wiling away a quiet day will fly and run to hide. No more to hop in to visit. Once hiding from the gun, now fleeing from their home
The Crows no more to hide in your furrows and beautifully call to eachother in their autumn gathering. Seagulls lost in where the host of insects at flight in summer height have gone. No swooping, twisting and diving for their supper
Crickets singing in the grass, Snakes, and Aphids, Butterflies Moths and Midges. Mound for Hedgehog, Mole, Badger, Field Rat and Mouse dispersed
The countless birds that nest and congregate in your wood. A safe place, a quiet place. Gazing down on Bluebell floor
Forgive us as we see you hold the weight of so called progress. The headlight soon to glare across your surface, not the waxing moon
Forgive us as we try to stop measurement of your place, and try to awaken the blindness to our need for you
I pray you will not go, not go at all and not go quickly. But my tears, they continue to fall, heavy anguished tears, as I see a friend torn up
Beautiful view you absorbed my pain, gave me hope and a place to dream.
Penny – Hope found in M.E. April 2021
Love to all⚘
My heart literally hurts now when I hear the Skylark. What will his future be, where will it be?
Hope found in M.E. 
I remember years ago, seeing a field just outside of the town limits I live near. I wished I had the money to purchase and preserve because even as a youth, I knew what was coming. Now today, what was once field, holds houses. They keep adding them to any space barely large enough to hold another. I weep silently for what was lost to the advancement of man.
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Totally with you there, Rebecca. I too would buy this field if I could. It’s just so sad. Nature carries on innocently unaware until it’s habitat is suddenly gone. The wood is uncharacteristically quiet as it sits within a pincer movement. It’s devastating.
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I wonder though, if nature itself doesn’t in some fashion know. I have read that animals know when a natural disaster is coming. I have read that plants are alive, so I wonder if nature doesn’t know..
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It probably does. Defenseless.
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I understand. I see new houses popping up and I feel sad .
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Yes, I agree. It really is so sad. We all need homes, of course, but equally we need nature.
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I hope your beautiful field can be saved from development Penny. Have you shared your post with your local newspaper and radio station? Sending love and hugs your way and please give sweet Tia a gentle pat from us all 🤗💖🐕 xxx
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Thank you so much, Xenia. I have had quite an indepth chat with local planning, and it would seem the chances are slim. I’m hoping the Wildlife Trust for this County might be able to help in some way. I’d love to see a section preserved as a nature reserve, but that will be a long shot. But better care of the wood would be a great outcome. But I will keep trying, while there is still time. I’ve tagged a local news outlet on twitter, will find others. Love and hugs to you, Eivor and Pearl. And licks from Tia. 💕🐩💕xxx
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Beautiful yet sad …
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Thank you Nisha. 💕
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