September morning and its cold but bright. Where summer was soft and furred at the edged, autumn has a crispness, not quite an ice sculpture but something of its quality. The shadows of the trees in the park stretch almost to its edge; 200 yards of dark green with a golden green tributary of sunlight extends from the sky behind all the way to the top of the shadow edge where it opens up into the broad reach of the sunlit estuary and the sunlight sea.

On days like this there is a sense of the fruits have ripened and the harvest festival will soon be upon us. Now is the time when we will reap what we have sown and what will that be? And will the fruits of summer labours be enough to sustain through the long dark winter.

This morning the shadows are long, the sun is bright but you can sense that this is the end. Even the water splashes in the pool are sharper and harder. The water is getting denser, stickier and colder. Sent from my BlackBerry?? wireless device