Waiting.

Waiting.

Just sitting around. A pale blue of morning sunny sky filters white through a thin veil of mist, sending beams of light down through trees while a never-ending succession of industrious wasps are in, out, in and out of a wee hole in the ground. Above, a magnificent Lime tree sparkles with a million translucent droplets of dew it has gleaned from the moist air.

We are all waiting for the go-ahead to start work. Muffled conversations of workman’s banter and laughter mix with rustle of cigarette papers from the ubiquitous white van. From the trees, the shoutings of a magpie and crow. In the distance, pigeons hoot and all around, a plethora of song birds give a morning concert of rowdy chirping and tweeting cacophony. The crow and magpie are in the same ivy-covered pine; I wonder if they’re arguing over something that’s none of my business. My attention is caught by a dragonfly, whirrs past my head so close I feel the air beat by its wings on my hair. It lands on a shiny laurel leaf and sits; a still, intricate, perfect form, a foot from my head. I watch as I wait.

The mist thins in the languid air and its faint breath hardly bothers the leaves of Laburnum and Birch in the garden. We wait. A dog barks. A tractor grumbles past dragging a heady aroma of manure and diesel.

Waiting. It’s the best part of the day.