I confess. I have a love-hate relationship with rabbits.
Some days, they seem adorable -- a harmless delight. Catching sight of one bounding off into the brush with the bright white underside of its tail bobbing in harmony with its hopping -- makes me smile.
Other days, I feel one step short of shooting any rabbit I see -- which will never really happen because I don't own a gun. I typically have these homicidal impulses right after I discover some substantial or valued part of my garden has been gobbled up by the pesky critters.
Still other days, I am neutral on the topic of rabbits. On these days, in the war I wage with rabbits, I have won a battle or two and the many barriers I've put in place to keep them away from my garden are actually working. Unfortunately, these days are few and far between because rabbits are very determined critters, taking second place only to beavers in the single-mindedness of their endeavors.
Today was the first kind of day... the adorable Peter Rabbit arrived for a lengthy visit. I had the privilege to visit Hill Top House in the Lakes District in England where Beatrix Potter did a great deal of her work in illustrating and writing children's stories in the early 1900's. While Peter Rabbit was only one of her many characters, he is arguably the most well known... world famous no less.
Fittingly, the day looked like a fairy tail (pun intended) from the very start. The sun was out, joyfully announcing the arrival of spring. The temperatures were ideal... not too cold, not too hot. Once the morning chill evaporated, the temperature was just right (and it had nothing at all to do with porridge). A multitude of lambs were out in pasture, enjoying the green grass with their mothers comfortably nearby. A smattering of clouds in the sky moved against the bright blue backdrop fueling a seemingly endless sequence of unique landscapes.
My friend Alice and I opted to drive less rather than more today... which drastically reduced the risk associated with the challenge of driving on the "wrong" side of the road amid narrow lanes and crazy fast drivers. Driving less required a boat, so we drove from Ambleside (an adorable town that has the honor of being the biggest seller of outdoor clothing and supplies in England, despite its small size) to Windermere to catch a boat across the lake to our destination. The boat in question was the cutest little ferry ever made with an eighteen car capacity that also held room for a handful of foot passengers like us. Quite a contrast to the Washington State ferry (capacity between 90 and 144 cars) that we were accustomed to.
In a short ten minutes, the ferry whisked us from the east side of Lake Windermere to the less populated west side. From the dock, we walked the landscape for what seemed like many miles even though the signs along the route continued to repeat for quite some time that it was only 1.5 miles further to Hill Top House. Finally, the milepost signs started to drop to 3/4 miles, then 1/3 then 1/4. I guess there had been a sale on 1.5 mile signs when the signposts were installed.
We passed through wooded areas, pastures populated with contented sheep and new lambs, and a feast of old stone buildings, churches, and other structures that made it very clear we were no longer in the United States. England and the Lakes District had offered us a perfect day with perfect landscapes and plenty to gawk at. I thought for sure that arriving at Hill Top House would be anticlimactic.
Not exactly.
At Hill Top House, we were granted a moment of time to look into the window of the life of Beatrix Potter -- a window that extended well beyond Miss Potter, the movie and that left me wandering in musing and whimsy for the rest of the day. The self-guided tour began in her gardens. Weeping wisteria, rhododendrons, azaleas, and a variety of other flowers had erupted in a rainbow of colors at the peak of spring bloom. The flowers alone would have been enough to entertain me for an afternoon, but there was still the house to see.
As we entered the house, I felt drawn to the window seat. Nestled in the seat and basking in sunshine, I picked up a copy of "The Tale of Samuel Whiskers or The Roly-Poly Pudding" and was soon lost in the story. As I read, I should have been horrified that two very large rats were busy trying to turn Tom Kitten into dinner, first tying him up, then slathering him in butter, then rolling him in dough... to make Roly-Poly pudding. But with the clever illustrations and the rhythm of the story, it was hard to be disgusted by the rats (as I would certainly be in any real-life situation involving rats).
Instead I laughed at the antics of Tom Kitten and breathed a sign of relief when he was rescued. The rats were ultimately banished to Father Potato's barn (where they and their progeny apparently wreaked havoc for many years upon all nature of things stored in said barn). And who knows what happened to Tom Kitten... precocious, mischievous little thing that was bound to find trouble every day of his feline life.
Beatrix Potter had a way of spelling out the reality of predator-prey while simultaneously anthropomorphizing both and pulling it all together into a story suitable for children. I could imagine that her Roly-Poly pudding was inspired when she heard rats scratching away in the walls of Hill Top House (as the tour informed us to be the case). I am very impressed by this. How you can create anything of artistic value when rodents are abounding in your home? That takes a level of character, drive, and strength that I will never have. Rats in my walls or in my attic (or anywhere in my vicinity) only inspire fear and homicidal impulses in my world. Ugh.
Despite the fact that two of the main characters were large rats, Roly-Poly Pudding colored the rest of my time at Hill Top House in the most pleasant of ways. I felt that I had a little window into Ms. Potter's spirit and artistic flow and had a wonderful time soaking in the things she left behind in her home for us to better understand and know her.
When leaving Hill Top House, I saw this sign in the road, cautioning us to be careful that Peter Rabbit might indeed spring out of the brush at any moment and hop onto the road. In my whimsical state of mind, I didn't find it hard to imagine that he might just do that.
More photos of the trek to Hill Top House, via slideshow:
No comments:
Post a Comment