Never Totally Trust the Weather Forecast

You know I was having a bit of a pity party about not being able to get out and about
yesterday on what the forecaster's had said was to be
the only good day of the week?

Well they didn't get it right at all!

Though we did have the forecast rain in the night,
today dawned bright and sunny and warm.

Better yet

I got out and about!

It is only a fifteen minute drive from where we live to the lovely old  town of Kenilworth,

home to an ancient castle, abbey ruins,

and some of the loveliest quintessentially English cottages,
so off we went.

The photo above is the restored Abbey ponds.

It is the site where the abbot of the original Abbey of Saint Mary's, and his monks 

would have kept their stock of fish to live off.

The pool is drier than we have seen it for some time.

Usually we can watch a heron or two fishing from the edge of the reeds,

but whether it was the children thronging the Abbey Fields that put them off, 

or the dryness of the pool, they were not in evidence on this,

my first visit for some three months.

Interestingly the brook

that runs alongside

the footpath bordering the pool

didn't seem very depleted at all

and our walk was accompanied

by the chuckling water song

that I love to hear.

There is usually a dog or two

enjoying a good splash here

with as like as not a disgruntled owner

trying to entice said canine friend

to leave the water,

come ashore,

and head for home.

This spot running near to the old castle walls is one of the doggy favourites but today the children won out
and made it their own.

Our short walk took us past the castle walls,

and I stuck my camera through the railings

to take this shot of the interior.

It was in this castle that Robert Dudley entertained

Elizabeth the First

in the hope of wooing her to be his wife,and

herein is the root of the castle's mystery.


In 1560 Earl Dudley's wife Amy Robsart

fell to her death,
and despite his acquittal it is still believed that
his urgent desire for a royal wife

may mean that

she died here at her husband's hand.

(Can you imagine the spooky mood music?
Sadly I'm too technically challenged to supply any).

*

Below is the dried up moat, at the side of the path I stood on to take the photo of the castle ruins.
As you see it is full of reeds and bull rushes at present, but soon to be re-filled by the autumn rain no doubt.

So there we were back to the car,

with still enough energy to make a brief call on some friends

who have been poorly.

When I came to think of it I was believing more

than the negative weather forecaster yesterday.

At some level I was listening to the ominous whisper

that I wasn't going to regain my strength this time around,

and it was this that had really been weighing me down.

                                        I know I'm too prone to listen to the promises of doom,

hardly able to credit that what I fear are merely shadows

that I am not meant to live within.

If I'm physically below par,

I recognise it's even more likely I'll have to struggle to stay positive;

yet even as I write that I remember 

the many many times I've been granted

the grace to have joy 

in the most unlikely of places.

I remember the words of Is 43:2:-

"When you go through deep waters, I will be with you.

When you go through rivers of difficulty, you will not drown.

When you walk through the fire of oppression, you will not be burned up; 

the flames will not consume you".

Living Bible translation

Why on earth do I build my days on believing weather forecasts

or my own gloomy, disatisfied thoughts?

May you be wiser than I.

God Bless