As no doubt are most of us, I’m more than sick of the abhor­rent mess­es that plague the world. There­fore, instead of screeds of smug, scold­ing ver­biage, this last blog of  the year from the prism of my kayak, will endeav­our to share the wis­dom of Hip­pocrates: “Nature itself is the best physician.” 

For starters, there’s no bet­ter anti­dote to the stress that what­ev­er we do must be mea­sured in sec­onds, both exter­nal and self-imposed…

…than being dwarfed by the sheer mag­ni­tude of a nat­ur­al land­scape sculpt­ed  over mil­len­nia, and noth­ing we, or any tech­nol­o­gy we con­jure up, can do to change that for the bet­ter, if at all.

For those occa­sions when the seem­ing­ly end­less duties of dai­ly liv­ing feel a lit­tle more oner­ous than was bar­gained for, what could be a bet­ter balm than the beau­ty of respon­si­bil­i­ty and trust encap­su­lat­ed in a loon chick wait­ing hope­ful­ly as one of it par­ents dips its head under water look­ing for fish for lunch.

And for those of us who tend to despair that the behav­iour and expec­ta­tions of the younger gen­er­a­tion aren’t “how it used to be in our day”…

…a line of mer­gansers bare­ly out of the avian equiv­a­lent of their teens, is a reminder of  how much fun hang­ing out and show­ing off with friends was.

It’s also good to know that some­times the seem­ing­ly per­fect­ly ordered world of Nature fits clich­es of human nature.
“Bit­ing off more than you can chew”, or “your eyes are big­ger than your stom­ach” come to mind.
                                 SHEER BEAUTY
A water lily bloom lasts for a mere three to five days.
But I defy any­one to gaze at one, and con­jure up the ugly places and things that besmirch the world beyond its short realm.

More like­ly, it will stir some­thing akin to what we all felt, away back when the world was full of won­der. When we believed that we all we had to do was leap, and we would soar into the unknown, and see it all.

As for that chick wait­ing to be fed…

This is him, or her, pad­dling con­fi­dent­ly in the reflec­tions of the colours of autumn that her­ald the arrival of both of our depar­tures for oth­er climes.
I hope this left you, as it has me, feel­ing rejuvenated.
(Kayak under cliff pho­to by Alexan­der Pizzey, all oth­ers by author).
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