RURAL RIDE

Cycling between the crowds of cow parsley on the lane from Seaton Ross is like floating through champagne bubbles.

My reverie is interrupted by three deer crossing the lane, and then, literally, disappearing into the cover of the cow parsley and young cereal crops.

Each time I see deer, I am struck by how much more evolved they are than us humans. Deer don't have jobs, don't have tax returns or mortgages, need nothing other than the earth provides in fullness, are carefree, boundless creatures and are a lesson to me always of how life ought to be - effortless, mellifluous, serendipitous, mainly completely free of anxiety. Oh that we humans had invented for ourselves a path that were this simple!

Deer are cruel too. There they are. There they are not. Gone, in an instant, and even stopping to see their exit path from lane to fields gives no clue as to their exact whereabouts. As cruel and fleeting a vision of bliss as many a human has.

Cow parsley has a crueller reputation too. Mother Die, is its rural nickname. This aroused my curiosity. The sense  I make of it is that hemlock - lethally poisonous - is easily confused with cow parsley, and thus, in an effort to keep rural children from making a terrible mistake, cow parsley has taken one for the umbrella - headed plant team.

There, amid the myriad of the white froth, comes the thought that bliss is to be had, right there, right now, ignoring the small risk of superstitious poison, breathing in the heady smell of the present moment, filled with wildflowers. And the faint musk of deer.

Be simple, I tell myself. Be free.