Sun was sinking slowly and lighting the fluffy floating seeds as it went. Boy Three and I were walking home through the still, mild evening.
This’ll make a lovely photo.
But then, Boy Three’s hot sticky fingers squeezed mine. “Mum do you promise to hold my hand all the way home?”
“Of course I do. If you want.”
It was quiet for a while. Over-blown flower-heads teetered on mottled stems swaying slightly as we passed. A spider strolled down its web.
How pretty.
“It’s like the Bear Hunt, mummy.”
“How’s that?”
“Swishy, swashy in the long grass.”
But it wasn’t grass, he was swishing the crispy orange leaves as he walked. “Swoosh,” he kicked a swathe.
I wonder if he’d do that again when I get my phone camera out…
“Listen,” we paused by the fence. “Wow, that’s noisy.” The calf was industriously cropping the grass. Then it noticed us and came to breathe loudly and blink liquid black eyes.
Boy Three breathed heavily in return and began to slink back behind me, still clutching my hand.
“It’s OK. He’s just nosy. He just wants to see what we are doing. Imagine how boring it must be stuck in that field all day.”
A rasping crow swooped low, wheeled and landed on the telegraph post.
Cow, crow and boy gazing was a fabulous composition, with the dropping sun.
“Come on mum,” he led me past bulbous brambles and glossy hips.
“I wish I could whistle,” a change of conversation. Perhaps the quiet called for it. So we fuffed and blew for a bit.
Suddenly tears filled Boy Three’s eyes. “I can’t click my fingers either,” he nearly wailed demonstrating a pudgy non-click.
“I can only do it with one hand,” I confessed. And it’s true, though I only discovered it then. We practiced non-clicking for a while. It’s more of a rustle.
If only I could capture the whiskery thistle tops and the down on the willow herb, like what’s left of old men’s hair. That and the boy’s concentration.
But Boy Three had dropped, squatting to the ground. “It’s a dead slug, mum,” he poked it with a stick.
“Oh yes. So it is.”
“We’re nearly home, aren’t we?”
“Yes. Thank you for walking with me.”
“‘Sok. Can I have an ice cream?”
“Yes,” but he’d set off running.
And that is why there weren’t any pictures of the most beautiful evening.
You painted it perfectly 🙂