I had an alarming experience today. I was transported back in time half a century. Yes, half a century. That’s half a whole lump of history, a lot of which has already been dissected by Simon Schama and Hollywood on telly. A class of eight year olds came for a school visit, to learn about bio-diversity. As they formed a crocodile and were made to hold hands with someone they hated to walk down the green lanes being lectured at by a wrinkly old git (me) about hedgerow life, wild flowers and grasshoppers, I remembered 1954 (OK, so more than half a century) and a similar event.
The other scary bit was to discover that I am married to a natural teacher. Sarah is brisk, cheerful, has a fistful of notes, can answer any question thrown at her (including ‘how did you kill your pigs? Did you stab them?’), and has a first aid kit, a pond dipping net, a two bug catchers in her bag, as well as having perfected a speech on biodiversity that’s taken me 20 years to do badly. So I feel old and I’ve not done my homework properly.
Actually, I’m also really lucky. I’m the only one allowed to ogle Sarah’s bum and get away with it, and I have to say, she looks a killer in khaki shorts and T shirt. The kind of teacher one fell in love with 54 years ago.
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This is the story of a rural life, lived by Sarah and Christopher on their 40 acre Wealden farm, near Rye, which they share with assorted animals, wild flowers, trees, an eclectic array of locals and the odd visitor who thinks it's an idyll. Sometimes it is.
