#ASMSG An Extract from 'THE WISHING WELL'

Deep within the countryside where fields are a plenty. The fields are being ploughed in readiness for planting crops, corn, wheat, vegetables and sugar beet. With their heads bowed down the shires plough on pulling the heavy steel digger, turning the ground over and over. Their handler steering them into a straight line from top to bottom of the field and then back down again, their toils are endless until the day’s work is over. They work from dawn to dusk, but at their day’s end there is the chance to be unharnessed and run wild in the nearby field, free to rest, sleep, eat and be groomed.

At the bottom of this field runs a brook, gently flowing, rippling over the pebbles that lay beneath the surface and in amongst the reeds, lilies on the brooks banks, if you look very quietly, silently there can be seen smallish fish like the stickleback, carp that thrive in the rivers stream. There is a flicker of life the insects coming to life from their winter’s hibernation. Time is time to feed and grow; soon it will be time for the dragonflies, the butterflies, coming out of the cocoons  a myriad of colours will adorn the countryside once again, If only for a fleeting moment during the summer months. The swans are making their nests on the rivers grassy plains, just a short distance from the stream; the ducks are now making their familiar noises quack quacking to each other. Is this their way of greeting each other?