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Love is all you need, though a nice drink helps. On the martsh with Eddie…

17 February 2018 by Simon Barnes 5 Comments

#ShowTheLove with @TheCCoalition www.rspb.org.uk/showthelove

My mother had a ritual saying when given glass of whisky on a cold evening: “I can feel it doing me good.” That’s true of nature as well.

Nature does us good. Access to nature allows us to live longer and happier lives. There’s any amount of research and many thousands of figures, all proving that nature make everything better. We are saner, healthier, more decent and more likeable people when we have nature in our lives. I have taken most of this on board because the arguments are convincing – and because I find an answering echo in myself.

Don’t listen to me. But perhaps the best way to direct our society is to listen to the voices of the vulnerable. They are closer to important matters than the rest of us, and can tell us things that louder and stronger voices drown out.

When Eddie and I are out together in a wild place, I need no arguments and no figures to understand that love of nature is as important as every other love. Eddie makes it obvious. He is, as regular readers of this space well know, my younger son, aged 16 and with Down’s syndrome.

Out in the vicious cold we sipped kind warm drinks. We watched the speeding gulls overhead and wondered if for them, the wind was the loveliest thing in the world. As the weather sucked the warmth from our bones, perhaps the gulls could feel it doing them good. Why not? After all, we could.

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Posted in Wildblog

Comments

  1. BRIAN STEWART says

    17 February 2018 at 11:51 am

    Happy days!

    Reply
  2. Mrs Andy Lloyd Williams says

    17 February 2018 at 2:29 pm

    Love the badges too: were they from Valentine’s Day?

    Reply
  3. Jen Ferguson says

    18 February 2018 at 10:34 am

    So very good to find a new posting ….had been thinking and worrying that perhaps you had gone ‘off duty’! Loved all you had to say re connecting with nature. This comes to you from Cape Town and I think our drought has made most of us very aware of how insignificant we are in the great scheme of thing.

    Loved the photo and couldn’t help thinking what a lucky fellow is Eddie – to have the father he does!

    Reply
  4. Michael Groves says

    18 February 2018 at 1:13 pm

    Your writing sure does me good. All the best to you and Eddie.

    Reply
  5. Anthony Bird says

    18 February 2018 at 1:56 pm

    I too got a bit worried when the postings appeared to dry up but we need not have worried, a blog of the usual excellent standard reminding me that now my pacemaker has been fitted it is time to think about getting out again and watching the birds. A nice photo too, thank you Simon and Ed.

    Reply

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