Friday, April 10, 2020

Telling the time in blossoms

You can just make out the swings in the park in the valley below us. This playground is usually busy, even with rain clouds threatening it should be crowded with children enjoying the Passover vacation.

It has been empty for weeks now.

On the first night of Passover people came out on to their balconies at 20:30 to sing holiday songs together. Across the valley we could hear people shouting festive greetings and someone was twirling a rainbow LED hula hoop.

I'm glad my neighbour's trees partly obscure the view so that we can enjoy nature even while stuck at home. We do a lot of birdwatching from our window. This spring we have seen magnificent flocks of cranes, storks and assorted raptors migrating between Africa, the Middle East and Europe.

The trees help us to tell time. We began isolating when the neighbours' peach tree was starting to bloom, watching it reach peak pink blossoms which as the weeks passed have turned to tiny baby peaches.

Today I noticed that the olive tree you see in the photo has just begun to sport some tiny olive fruitlets. We wonder what the world will be like by the late autumn when the olives start to ripen.

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