I haven’t been writing much lately (too busy enjoying myself) so I thought I’d forego the usual Sunday rhyme time and try a bit of weekend wittering instead.

What’s up with the bees?

Our resident bees are still nesting outside the bedroom window and it’s a hive of activity!  My how they’ve grown.  Last time I wrote about them we weren’t totally sure what kind of bees they were, but now we see plain as day they’re bumble bees (they’re so big and furry!)  Sadly, many of them are reaching the end of their life cycle and we’ve started finding their bodies on the ground around the nest.  The worker bees life cycle is only 4 weeks and they will push any sick bees from the nest to prevent disease.  I tried to help some out the other day with some sugar water in a shallow bowl, but only succeeded in luring in and (accidentally) killing some ants who got mired in the sticky stuff: a prime example of trying to solve one problem but creating another, I guess the best thing to do is leave well alone and let nature take its course. 

It’s fascinating watching the male bees strutting their stuff outside the nest and waiting for a likely queen to emerge.  I haven’t actually seen any bees doing the dirty deed; apparently they tend to land on foliage rather than mate mid-air because while the actual mating takes minutes they will continue copulating for another forty minutes or so while the male inserts a ‘bung’ to secure his seed and prevent any of the competition from impregnating the same queen, who knew?

Finding my sea legs (and then my land legs)

I’ve not long returned from an epic cruise of the Norwegian fjords. I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about cruising, but it was one of the most sociable holidays I’ve been on and the scenery from the ship (and off it) was jaw dropping, happy memories made. Though I did feel like I was still sailing for a good few days after I disembarked, an interesting sensation that left my body listing like I’d recently enjoyed a large glass of wine. Whilst not entirely unpleasant, I’m glad it’s worn off. We were lucky enough to be in Norway for their constitution day, where everyone dresses up in traditional dress (think Anna and Prince Hans from Frozen) and celebrates. It seemed like a day for the young one’s who were thoroughly enjoying themselves, the Norwegians know how to party. We visited an oil museum, where I marvelled at many feats of human engineering, and found some hope for the future; it seems in the not so distant past us humans were hunting whales to extinction for their blubber, then oil came along and replaced whale blubber in many areas, yay for the oil industry! Until an internet search revealed this isn’t quite as cut and dry as it seems. Search the ‘whale oil myth’ if you’re interested. Yet I still have hope we’ll find another way. Oh, and I visited an igloo, pretty cool!

Touch my feet!

I’ve recently discovered the magic of reflexology.  How someone can make your whole body feel buttery just by touching your feet is beyond me, but I’m sold on it.  I had an almost transcendent experience after my first session and felt a deep and complete sense of peace for a couple of days, with the added bonus of feeling like I was walking on clouds, surreal yet deeply relaxing, would recommend.

In a world of my own

I was wandering in the supermarket the other day, lost in some kind of dinner planning reverie, probably with a crinkle of concentration between my eyebrows, so that I hovered uncaringly at the exit to an aisle which was blocked by a shop worker and her large crates of produce to be dispensed to the shelves.  As I stood, trying to decide if butternut squash or sweet potato would make a better accompaniment to brisket, the lady apologised and moved the crates after a colleague told her to look out behind her,

‘Sorry,  I was in a world of my own,’ she laughed.

‘Don’t worry, so was I,’ I replied.  I had been as lost in my thoughts as she was in her work, but she wasn’t the first person to say that expression to me that day; a lady in another shop earlier hadn’t noticed me either and said the same thing, and I often find myself saying this to other people, but only today did I reflect on how true it is.  We’re all wandering around in our own small worlds, our heads whirring with thoughts and ideas, worries and distractions.  When we bump up against someone else’s world it will hopefully be a peaceful merging, but depending on where we are in our minds it isn’t always so. Our worlds aren’t always aware what’s going on in other people’s and vice versa and I do my best to remember this.  How many conversations do we have in our head, arguments, rants, laughs and love, that we never actually have in real life? 

Edgar Allan Poe sums up the dangers of staying in our own inner world:

“I remained too much inside my head and ended up losing my mind.”

“Get out of your head and into the moment”

Eckhart Tolle

There is a whole world in there, but sometimes it’s best to get out of it. It seems that my best times are when I emerge from that inner ‘world of my own’ to connect with another person, or with the awe of life unfolding in front of me, like the resident bees, or a touch from one of my children, shared laughter with my husband; if I can surface from the mired pool that is my inner world and connect with the world that’s in front of me, then everything somehow feels lighter and easier all at once.

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Well that concludes my weekend wittering, I hope this Sunday finds you well, feel free to witter back in the comments and let me know how things are in your world.