"I have just awoken and risen after eleven hours heavy sleep. Indeed, I could so easily have slept on and on that when I next awoke, the summer had passed and autumn beckoned. I wonder what it would be like to have one's life flash before them as though one experienced the passing of four seasons in one day?
Nothing halts the pleasure of my senses more than the passing of a season. I love all four seasons of our green and pleasant land in equal measure, yet treasure them for different reasons.
I love the spring because of the new birth it represents; to see the bounce return to an old man's stride and the colourful dress of the courting young as they look for hidden places to pledge their love in sweet surrender. I love the summer for the pleasures of life it provides in abundance, where sun and shade compliment feelings of relaxation as they touch the skin of humans in search of solar pleasure. I await the autumn for the true purpose of change it reveals and the way it gladly sheds its past in preparation for taking on new foliage in the seasons to come. Though often brisk and cold, I thank the winter for its timely reminder that hibernation and rest are good for the mind, body and soul. It helps to restore the nature of the forests and is the nurturer of mankind.
And yet to witness summer slowly die and know that the flowers will soon fade within a month or so, grasses wilt, leaves prepare to fall and creatures withdraw once more to their woodland bolt holes and hidden nests above and below ground, produces a time of personal reflection upon the gradual passing of one's own existence.
But behold the new life that awaits us all; fear not the passing of yearly months and nature's seasons for they will never die. There is a great comfort in knowing that while our life within nature's woods is often confined to no more than three score years and ten, that we too will face rebirth in every child we ever parented and every family relation that bears our name and carries our physical nuances and peculiarities and mimics the way we looked, walked, talked and stood, or held our teacup between forefinger and thumb. Rejoice for their springs to come and the woods they will inhabit. Though they are not yet born; be ever glad that they have still to taste the sweet and sacred summers of their dreams, and have yet to realise the bountiful harvests that their family and heritage will yield in the shaping of their purpose." William Forde: July 25th, 2017.