New year’s day began in my garden without any apparent difference to the one before it; grey, cold and wet. After the fireworks of new year’s eve, what a damp squib.
My first look out of the window revealed three wood pigeons sitting miserably, shoulders hunched in a bare cherry tree, a female blackbird shuffling through the rotting leaves beneath the beech hedge and the only visible bird showing any sign of perkiness, a little wren, her natural demeanour an antidote to a general lack of interest in anything much.
The problem is I think, that for us in the northern hemisphere, January is such an inappropriate time to celebrate anything new and we expect too much of it. The wildlife in our gardens is just concentrating on getting through the winter alive and my over riding emotion is one of concern. For new beginnings, my own favoured date would be the spring equinox on the 21st of March when the fulcrum tips, the days lengthen towards summer and we can all look forward to our gardens picking up the pace of life.
It’s the time for fresh green leaves to unfurl and new flowers to open daily, for insects to emerge and take advantage of flowing nectar and pollen and for the first of our migratory birds to begin to arrive home. The natural world tells us loud and clear through the amplifier of our gardens that spring is on its way and new life is everywhere.
I’m not alone in my preferred choice for a date to mark the new year. I read this morning that the brilliant nature writer Robert Macfarlane would prefer that date too and if we’d been born between the fall of the Roman Empire and 1582 when Pope Gregory X111 decided to change it, we would actually celebrate new year on the 25th of March.
It worked well with our agricultural way of life and much more sensible in my opinion, immeasurably more in tune with nature at our latitude. But as with every other aspect of life that I have no choice other than accept (after I’ve had a grumble), I’ll make the best of it and look forward to lengthening days, less inclement weather and a new year in my wild and wonderful garden. Happy new year!
