1. My walk over the park takes me past a blue cupboard full of books, free for anyone to take.
2. This year the hawthorn boughs are bent, weighed down with clusters of hard crimson berries.
1. He sees that I'm carrying a large and tasty mushroom that I have found on the common, and I see that he sees, and we both smile.
2. We come to the end of our book, and spend some time speculating about loose threads and whether there might be a sequel.
3. The plot of the book I'm reading (to myself) twists suddenly in my hands: a quiet side character acts with unexpected agency, and puts herself in peril. Now I'm desperate to keep reading, and my eyes keep getting drawn to the book's yellow spine.
1. When I turn out a pot, I find fat worms writhing in the soil, and a bright gold centipede, and a handful of bulbs waiting for next year.
2. He's been quite secretive about his plans, and then I get a message with a location share.
3. I like being the one to collect the takeaway part of the meal because it means I'm not the one striding around the kitchen with table mats and water jugs and raw vegetables while persuading everyone to come to the table.
1. We are sheltered under the garden centre's great barn roof. There is a rush of sound and air as the rain comes down.
2. A mushroom, come from apparently nowhere, has risen up in the dry dark of the compost heap.
3. I just show up to travel well drinks, knowing no-one, and over a swift half I learn some useful things and hear some good stories.
1. I later discover that she took seriously my passing comment about picking up an ice lolly for her brother.
2. ...and strolling through the door, there's a face from the past remembered with gladness, and a face I thought was in Scotland.
3. We walk briskly home under the stars, feeling very pleased that we've been out for a swift pint and a hour or so of live music.
1. Cobwebs gleam where they catch the low-angled sun -- polygonal nets strung from brambles; gauzy dancefloors in the gorse.
2. Tipping the rest of the bag of epsom salts into the bath with a rainy swish.
3. The children bickering across me about things that just don't matter.
1. There is pink grapefruit juice at breakfast, which no one likes apart from me.
2. Sunday afternoon, and there's musicians sitting in the corner of the pub playing Irish tunes for us.
3. The moon isn't high enough during the eclipse, so we miss out on the spectacle of a blood-red moon with a bite taken out of it -- but we enjoy looking at the sky in hope, nonetheless.