“There’s a flavour of happiness that doesn’t photograph well. It’s not excitement or gratitude or triumph. It’s closer to a kind of ease. A person at rest inside their own life, not because everything is perfect, but because they’ve stopped requiring it to be . . . the happiest people I know have mostly subtracted things. They’ve dropped the argument with reality. Dropped the need to frame everything positively. Dropped the belief that happiness is something you have to generate rather than something that shows up when you stop blocking it.”
– Lachlan Brown (from an article on Space Daily)

I open the gate, and as I slowly walk towards the washing line, my eyes scan the landscape. I regularly remind myself to do that. Not just to appreciate the immediate beauty of it, but in the hope of catching a glimpse of the roe deer with her two little ones that live in the area.

As I hang the washing out, I notice the warmth of the early morning rays mingling with the coolness of the breeze on my exposed skin. I listen to the birdsong, but I mostly pay attention to the wind creating different sounds as it passes through a clump of bamboo, various types of trees, and the tall grass. The landscape has faded into a palette of yellows and browns, with only the dark greens of the trees providing splashes of colour.  

June has been hot, except for a couple of gloriously cool days, which means that I do most of my outside work between 6 and 8 or 9 am, before retreating into the shade or air-conditioned interior of the house.

Except for the zucchini and green bean seeds I pressed into the soil, as something of an afterthought, I don’t have a vegetable garden this year. Of course, I still have herbs and flowers, but I am waiting for us to level the soil in front of the house, before I start planning what will finally become a permanent garden. In the meantime, I buy fresh organic veg from a lovely couple with a market garden nearby.

Chores can quickly become overwhelming, as, even when regularly ticked off a list, they keep either coming back or are being replaced by new ones. It is therefore vitally important for me to regularly take time out to notice my surroundings.

The early morning birdsong that sounds different from the afternoon, the frenzied crowing of a cockerel in the distance, the wind rustling in the leaves of the vines on the porch, and the way the early morning light slants through them, glowing a rich orange.

I take deep breaths in these moments to soothe my thoughts that have a tendency to wander off and stir up discord. The feeling of always being two steps behind where I would like to be, can be very unsettling if not hold in check.

I am lucky to live in a place that invites slowing down and experiencing a deep sense of peace, but unless I am mindful of it, it can just as easily dissipate with the coolness of the early morning. The quinta isn’t a safeguard to the intrusions of the world, no matter how much I would love it to be just that. I know all too well how much work it takes to step away from the deluge of information and distraction that is at our fingertips at all hours of the day without respite, and because of that, I also know how important it is to savour those moments in which life feels ‘just right’. And the older I get, the more I am aware of these moments running out for me, and as such, shouldn’t be wasted.

Notes:
# At the beginning of the months when Michael final finished up the borehole the way he’s wanted to in a long time, and I carefully with the help of a funnel filled up the gap between two pipes with bentonite, the overriding switch failed. Michael’s knowledge can only take him so far, but luckily for us our electrician friend had time to pass by on his way to a nearby town, and with the fault correctly identified, he could buy the switch and install it on his way back that same afternoon.

# I bravely told Michael that I will take it upon myself to remove the silicon in the shower and redo it, after we bought all the necessary bits. I suspect that it was the last time that I have happily volunteered for that job.

# Other jobs included raking up piles of leftover rock after the stone mason finished the wall around the olive tree right in front of the house. Work on the dry-stone wall, which is very close to being finished, has come to a grinding halt, as we are waiting for more stone to be delivered. Unfortunately, we are not sure when that will happen, as the supplier doesn’t know either. Although I can’t wait for it to be done, I’ve also learned it is best to shrug it off, and focus on something else in the meantime.

# And then there were unexpected, unwelcome jobs like the steel delivery taking place, as I was driving back from Madrid after dropping Michael off at the airport. Luckily I no longer have spaghetti arms, as I had to move all the steel into the workshop, bar two pieces which were impossible to move alone.

# Strimming is a continuous chore, and although I’ve done a fair amount this months, I’ve taken a break until the tall grass has been cut and bailed before I finish the edges and left over areas.

# Summer is also that time of the year in which the cork oaks are harvested, and on a couple of early mornings, my own work was accompanied by the dull thud of axes, and the tearing away of the bark, punctuated against the flow of ongoing conversation, and the thin sounds of music floating out of a mobile phone.

# Another cork oak belonging to the same neighbour, whose tree came down in the freak tornado, finally broke off and fell into our land. The first half of the tree broke off four years ago, and since then, we’ve been waiting for the remaining half that reached over our land to come down. This time there wasn’t even a puff of wind, and lucky for us, there was also no damage to our dry-stone wall. For now, we are just leaving it be, and will most probably only deal with cutting it up when the weather cools down in autumn, as it is tucked away in a corner.

# The cats are never far away when I venture out in the evening, after the sun has slipped behind some tall trees, to water the garden. Mostly they are still lethargic in the remaining heat, but sometimes Lily entertains me by trying to catch the steady stream of water. These days, this often replace our daily walks, or otherwise we only go a very short distance before the daylight finally drains out of another long summer’s day.

# We often get scattered thunderstorms in June, and this year was no exception. Mostly it is just a lot of promise wrapped up in noise and possibility, but we did get a decent downpour on one of the days, which brought the total to 17mm of rain for the month, which is always welcome, as it never fails to bring cooler weather with it.

A Moment of Joy:
My moments of joy or often tied up with the gifts of having close encounters with the wildlife that can be found in the area. On various mornings I encountered the little roe deer (corço). Once, she came darting towards where I was standing, only to stop about 10 metres from me, and look me in the eyes, before turning around and disappearing in the same direction she originally came from.  Another morning, as I was slowly moving through the tall grass, cutting away the ragwort that is poisonous for horses, I spotted the ears of one of the little deer sticking out the tall grass a short distance away from me. It obviously got a huge fright, and quickly made its way to where it’s mom was waiting on the other side of the fence. I only realised that she gave birth to two little ones this year when I spotted them on our land one evening while watering the garden.

And then there was the evening when Midnight alerted me to something through the way her body tensed up, while staring into the grass. I stopped, and while still trying to figure out what she was looking at, a little head popped out. It belonged to a mongoose, who, the moment it saw me, dashed off in the direction of the dried-up seasonal stream, leaving a wave of movement in its wake.

Portuguese Traditions:
Corpus Christi, or Corpo de Deus (“Body of God”), commemorates the Last Supper, and is celebrated on the Thursday following Trinity Sunday, 60 days after Easter. In Portugal it is a public holiday, and is one of the country’s most important religious observances.

Street decorations known as os tapetes are a traditional, artistic expression prepared for the passage of the Corpus Christi procession. Ironically, the tradition that began in Portugal and spread to Brazil during the Age of Discovery, are no longer widely practiced in the country. Ponte de Lima in the north is still holding on to this tradition, transforming its streets into incredible works of art each year using coloured sawdust, coffee grounds, stones, flour, sand, and flowers.

Another Corpus Christi tradition in Ponte de Lima is the Vaca das Cordas (Cow of the Ropes), which dates back to around 1646. According to legend, a temple once stood where the main church is now located. Here, the locals worshipped a goddess in the form of a cow, which is why today, a bull is tied to long ropes with locals dodging it as it runs through the streets to the church, where it is led three times around the it to commemorate the conversion of the population to Christianity.

Written by: Jolandi