Day 21

I’m 70 now. I think. We haven’t tracked time closely for years. But I know that once the Michaelmas daisies bloom and the oaks start changing colour, it’s not long until my birthday.

So, I’m 70 now. Give or take.

I took my lunch up Todrick’s hill, sat down on one of Amy-jie’s blankets, listened to Marie’s birds, decorated my hair with Freddy’s daisies. It was almost like celebrating with them.

Almost.

The sun was warm.

I saw a fox. She trotted over to me, bold as you please, and studied my lunch. In the old stories, foxes are skittish and sly. I suppose she never learnt to fear humans. My roasted vegetables did not interest her. The chickens might, but, well, they’ll be on their own soon enough.

There were deer in the clearing below me. A doe and her fawn. They nibbled on the grass.

Its strange other animals are coming back, while we dwindle and die. But then, we were always their biggest threat. Take us out of the equation, give the planet a chance to recover, and boom, there they are, waiting to take back their place in the world.

And the squirrels! The “little nutkins”, Amira used to call them. They were everywhere. One even managed to steal some of my nuts! Rascal. Well, he still has his tail, putting him ahead of another Squirrel Nutkin I know.

One day, this will be proper old growth forest. The kind people studied and wrote about. I wish I could see it. Or had descendants who could see it. “Look,” I’d say, “we didn’t screw up completely. The forests are back, ancient and powerful.”

“Make sure you take care of it,” I’d say. “Do better than we did.”

But if we had done better, there would be children. And grandchildren. And great-grandchildren. My warning would not have been necessary.

Instead, I sit on the hill and watch proof of life all alone.

Sometimes, I feel like a ghost, haunting her home, guarding it jealously. And uselessly.

Happy birthday to me.