Monday, September 06, 2004

A few days ago there was a fox in our back garden

We live in a smallish bungalow in an okay part of Nottingham, it's a bit pricey for a couple with our meagre earning but after renting a few rubbish homes we decided that we'd had enough and a nice place to live was worth the extra money. One of the great things about the area is that it's next door to descent size park. There's not an awful lot to the park but it's nice and does have one special feature; a deer reserve. It's nice being able to look at the deer, and I intend to go over and draw a few soon now that I'm sketching again. The other great thing about being near a park is that we do get to see the odd fox, Rebecca once even saw a badger in our front garden, which I'm incredibly jealous of. Foxes aren't exactly rare and you don't just need to live near a park to see them, but it does mean we see them a bit more regularly. Anyway, the fox in our back garden was different, it was in our back garden during the day and I've never seen a fox in the day time. It was a bright sunny morning and Rebecca spotted it as she was making coffee. If you have a dog or a cat you've probably seen that beautiful serene expression on their faces when they're in that incredibly relaxed not quite asleep or awake state brought upon simply by lying in sunlight. It's an expression that looks just as good on a fox. It must have stayed in the long grass (we don't mow regularly) for ten minutes before finally leaving. For those ten minutes we barely spoke and I didn't even think to draw it. For some reason I only just remembered it today. There's scene in Stand By Me (the film and The Body the book it's based on) where a young boy and a deer look at each other, it lasts seconds but it's a beautiful moment, and when it's over it's gone, not forgotten, just a moment that doesn't quite exist in the regular world. That's how it felt with the fox in the back garden.

2 comments:

Danny said...

Yeah, foxes are wonderful. There's a family of them living close to us here in Turnpike Lane. Nic and I spent about 2 hours late last summer watching one sleep under a tree in the neighbours garden on a Saturday aftternoon. Didn't do a great deal other than sleep, occasionally turn around the tuck its tail over its nose, but it was totally magical.

Katy said...

Foxes are very, very noisy.