Colza, Sheep, Metamorphosis and Mindfulness

Reading Time: 2 minutes
Yesterday I took a picture of brilliantly yellow Colza with the Jura looking dark due to storm clouds overhead. If you walk at this time of year you will see a lot of cola. At the moment it is brilliantly yellow and at it’s prime. Later on, the colza will be passed its prime, and at this moment it will lose all of its petals, and become green, before drying up and becoming brown. Colza is not beautiful for that much of its growth cycle.

Colza field with the Jura in the background, looking dark due to thick clouds

I have been passing by some sheep for several days now and each time they have progressed down the field. I walked by the field yesterday and it was quite amusing to see the path of grazed grass they left behind them. It went from being a prairie field with long grass, to a short grass field. The sheep are doing their job well.

Sheep grazing in a field. You can see where they have been, and where they have yet to be.

At this time of year you see spiders and beetles running across the tarmac in front of you. It’s when hiking that I first noticed the hundreds, or even thousands of spiders running around beneath my feet

I try not to step on the beetles and spiders as I walk, and that’s why I noticed a beetle lying on its back. Upon seeing this my reaction was “This is a real life instance of “Metamorphosis”, the book about the person who wakes up, stuck on his back, unable to get up. It is rare for such a sight and I thought that I had filmed it, but I didn’t.

Although I walk around in circles or loops, I do notice new and different things on every single walk, which is why I walk these routes so regularly. I do vary between five to ten routes, but where I turn left instead of going straight, or right instead of left, etc.

And Finally

I started to “read” Mindfulness for Dummies while walking. I tried listening to other content but this one kept my attention. The idea that struck me, so far, is the idea of kindness. It speaks about learning to be kind to yourself, of not being negative about yourself. It is something worth hearing. I will be reading this as I walk from now until I finish it.