Of spilled milk and the joys of spring

The spilled milk (well, coffee)

Last Thursday morning got off a great start when I knocked a cup of coffee over, all over my bedroom carpet, when I was in a hurry to go out. A cup of milk would have been more traditional for what followed.

Because I had a job interview last Thursday, which in itself went ok. But. There was also a test at the start. And I realised on the way home I’d messed up the first part of that.

And having put a lot of time and effort into preparing for the interview, and having been excited at getting it, I spent Thursday afternoon and evening (and free time Friday) beating myself up about where I went wrong.

There is a plus to that. In Alice Through the Looking Glass, the White Queen starts screaming: “Oh, oh, oh. My finger is bleeding.” 

It isn’t, but a few moments later, her brooch flies open and pricks her finger.

Alice asks: “But why don’t you scream now?”

“Why, I’ve done all the screaming already,” said the Queen. “What would be the good of having it all over again?”

As and when I get an email saying they are sorry, but I didn’t get the job, it will confirm what I’ve already come to terms with. I’ve done all the screaming; no good doing it again.

To switch to a less-literary quote:

Mistakes are important because we learn from them.
So instead of wishing I never made any, I should just embrace what they teach me and move on.

That’s from an episode of Sabrina the Teenage Witch, which spookily (!) happens to be on as I type this.

And going back to the start of this: we cannot undo our mistakes. There is no point crying over spilled milk (or spilled coffee!).

And the joys of spring

Meanwhile, there are plenty of good things to enjoy in the present. 

The clocks went forward this weekend, to British Summer Time. The days have been noticeably getting ‘longer’ for a few weeks now (getting up in daylight, driving home from work in daylight!). 

Yesterday, the sky was blue and the sun was shining, and I ate my dinner (evening) meal in the back garden. The trees in the wood behind are still largely bare, which makes it easier to see acrobatic squirrels running along branches. The jackdaws have bits of potential nest in their beaks. The blackbirds are singing later and longer.

The pieris is in flower in my front garden, as is the viberbum, some autumn wallflowers (!), the ever-flowing nemesia, and some yellow primroses.

In the back garden, the sophora Sun King (main image) is a mass of flowers, as is the correa Dusky Bells (inset picture), and the berberis darwinii. Well, one of the berberis Darwinii: the other so far has precisely one flower on it. Which is odd, as they grow side by side!

 

I have planted out my seed potatoes, the tomato plants are hardening off in the greenhouse. The blueberry and honeyberry bushes have flower buds on them. The raspberry canes have green shoots on them. The deciduous kiwi Issai is coming into leaf, and the grape vine has strong buds on it.

This time of year, it is hard (as well as pointless) to cry too hard and long over spilled milk. Even when you can’t get the stain out of the carpet.