Loveliest of trees

This morning when I went down to feed the hens, there was a single blossom petal floating in the bucket of water I use to mix their mash. It's been a long, cold winter, but still - it doesn't seem that long ago when I found the first orange leaf floating there last autumn.

It was a lovely deep pink, the petal, probably off someone's cherry tree though I can't see one nearby. The plum tree behind the henhouse has pure white blossom, and the apple tree I planted nearby is pale pink.

Though our native bush is beautiful too, a million shades of green, it looks pretty much the same, year round, and sometimes it can seem a little sombre: for heart-lightening glory, it's hard to beat the blossom trees in spring, and the deciduous trees in autumn. That was something to look forward to when I lived in England, a kind compensation for the end of summer, and I always wanted to go to New England in the fall to see what everyone raved about.

A couple of years ago I finally went there, and it fulfilled every expectation - driving across Massachusetts into the Berkshires used up all my adjectives, the colour getting more intense the further north and higher we got. The locals were a bit critical of that year's display, but I was blown away, and never more so than when I joined a big and cheerful crowd on Columbus Day and climbed Mt Greylock. It was glorious.