forests and fairies

Growing up in Greater London, technically the suburbs, I was never too close to the city, nor too close to the countryside. This meant a trip to a park with a dense forest section, or an excursion outside of London and into the countryside was an absolute treat and a holiday (even if it was a day trip.) 

My favourite ‘forest’ in the world is in the south of Birmingham, and part of a nature trail called Holders Lane and Pebble Mill Fields. They’re a collection of playing fields within the trail, along with forestry and this is all within the southern suburbs of Birmingham. Rumour has it a settlement was once created there after World War I for returning soldiers and their families - I've never actually discovered if this is true or not and it's since been destroyed if it did exist.

"What these country/nature breaks taught me was that there is a whole world outside the humdrum of city life"

As a child, this small section of the trail seemed huge in my eyes and my imagination was left to its own devices, induced by the natural world around me. I was informed by my equally imaginative father that the King of the Trees, the Greenman, lived in these woods. Every Christmas, when I visited my grandparents who lived nearby, I'd leave a few mince pies on a tree stub in the forest for the King to celebrate Christmas too; a little Christian girl ensuring the Yule King enjoyed his celebrations.

There are small moss covered ponds - this is where I would fixate my gaze for ages in the hope that I'd find a fairy fly past, or see one peak from behind a leaf to say hello to me. I could have sat there for hours if it wasn’t for hunger and needing to run back to my grandmother’s dinner; we would eat either lentils or black eyed beans, Cypriot style, or sausages and mushy peas (I may be Greek but I’m also half thorough-bred Brummie!)

What these country/nature breaks taught me was that there is a whole world outside the humdrum of city life and these concrete surroundings aren’t forever. What is forever, though, is nature. This golden green, fiery and icy planet will outlive us all and even when our star - the sun - fades and this solar system disappears, this planet will still remain, even if it is one lump of dead rock. 

Visiting forests and nature trails, even a place like Kew Gardens, is a great way to ground us and calm us. I find nature also inspires my creative side and before I got into writing blogs, poetry was my escape. My creativity soars in poetry and poets like John Keats and William Blake speak to me the same way nature does.

Rhéa x

P.s. My husband proposed to me in the fields in Birmingham because he knew how much of a special place it is for me. So those fields hold an extra special memory.

The Lily by William Blake

“The modest Rose puts forth a thorn,T

he humble sheep a threat’ning horn:

While the Lily white shall in love delight,

Nor a thorn nor a threat stain her beauty bright.”