I’ve lost count of the number of times we’ve lived in lockdown land with all its’ variations on a theme. No matter how many times we get to visit, it doesn’t become any more enticing does it? We wouldn’t want to set up home here. It’s not what we’re made for. Thank goodness for the world outside our windows: bugs, beasties, plants, trees, hills, streams, seas – countless mini worlds that feed our imagination, bringing entertainment and comfort as they invite us to connect to something outside ourselves. Our lives have stopped and started over the last twelve months but their rhythm has remained steady as they respond to the beating drum of the changing seasons. Even ‘the girls’ have had to inhabit lockdown land because of the outbreak of avian flu. So, now we’re in March and the pace is picking up.
Rabbits and hares have been working on their masterplan for world domination since January. We think of this month as being the time when we see ‘mad hares’ in boxing matches. The boys will box each other to win the girl or to establish a hierarchy but the girls are equally as scrappy. The female (Jill) will box a male (Jack) if she’s not ready to mate. Females are larger than males, so Jill usually emerges the victor! Girls rule and Jack should know better! Matches can be seriously aggressive and fur may literally fly but they don’t only take place in March. They occur throughout the long mating season – from January to August. When a happy couple comes together, Jill makes a shallow hollow in the ground called a ‘form,’ to have her hare babies in. These leverets are born fully furred, able to see and pretty much independent from the moment they arrive. They’re ‘good to go’ and live out their hare lives within an hour after birth.
We’re starting to feel the air thicken with anticipation of our being ‘good to go’ – to fully live out our extraordinary, bittersweet human life as it should be lived, once more. However, a residual of lockdown loopy- ness is threatening our equilibrium. I’ve heard it a couple of times this week. Thankfully, Jack and Jill have been using the gift of verbal articulation to release their aggression and not their fists. I want to encourage you; come on folks! We have endeavoured through remarkable times. But unlike the hare, we can choose to engage with more constructive means of releasing the March madness. Get outdoors, walk, run, garden, dig, paint, plant, create, and plan. We are not a hare!! We are fearfully and wonderfully made, so let’s not behave like Jill – even though we all know that Jack really does deserve it!
With your “down” on the Jack’s it would be easy to c that u r Jill, but I like the article even so:-)}:‑)}:‑)
What can I say? When Jill says “no”, she means it !
What a ‘heartfelt’ statement. It gave Ian a chuckle! XX
I am continually gobsmacked at your writing skills, at how you are able to pull out of the bag something even better than the one before, thank you so much for enabling me to think about the country of my birth which I am unlikely to ever visit again, I could almost smell spring in your writing.
Thank you.
Absolutely loved it!!! ESPECIALLY about us being wonderfully and fearfully made…….