One muggy late September afternoon, a heavy grey cloud blanketing the sky, smothering the sunlight, I was not really heading anywhere with purpose; just walking along the paths amongst the high grass and trees that border the land between the houses and the valley fields.

It started to rain.  Thick, heavy drops of rain, that fell directly down as if they’d been dropped through a giant metal sieve in the sky. I felt each rain drop hit me with determined force, dark spots appearing across my faded green t-shirt. I took shelter beneath an oak tree at the side of the path and listened to the sound of the rain as it pattered off the leafy canopy above and around me.  Everything was otherwise still and silent.  

The air was warm and filled with the sweet earthy scent of the dampening ground.  The grass was bright lime green in the sun where shafts of sunlight speared the clouds. The leaves that sheltered me shone in low diffused light that filtered through the clouds and I admired the bounty of acorns that beaded the branches of the tree around me.  I imagined busy grey squirrels scampering along the boughs, harvesting the bounty in their tiny claws, gathering their store for the long cold winter to come.

Unexpectedly, I felt secure; comforted that I was still able to harvest simple pleasures and peace, just by sheltering from rain beneath a tree. Nature sometimes has a certainty that is re-assuring to a troubled mind.  

My thoughts turned to the coming autumn, with its landscape richly painted in burnished copper and bronze; the hedgerows burdened with the many wild fruits and berries that would nourish the wildlife through the harsh winter months to come.