Seeing

A stunning walk today. A clear sky, chilly enough to freeze puddles but not me, shoots of wheat peeking through the earth, a family of deer standing by the hedge and watching me more still-ly than I can ever stand and watch them. Suffolk at its best.

As I walked I was reflecting on a chance meeting I had yesterday with a woman who had only one eye. I hadn't even questioned why she was wearing dark glasses indoors, but after we'd been talking for a little and I'd mentioned my contact lenses, she told me that she lost an eye several years ago as the result of cancer. She took off her glasses to show me, and there was her ordinary eye and her other eye socket neatly covered with skin. If I had tried to imagine it, I think I would have thought of something more disturbing than this simple, almost business-like arrangement. I hoped that if I or any one I loved were to find ourselves in that situation, we too would be able to go beyond sadness and stoicism to the quiet dignity and positivity she possessed.

Gulls flew off from fields, and a heron stood by the river. The moon was up there, pale and not quite round. Bushes of scarlet rosehips reminded me of the wild roses that were here last summer and would be here again.

So much to see. So much to feel.