The Josephite Ministry In Scotland

Greetings from the sunny and dry Highlands of Scotland! For the first time since we came here last year, we’ve had to start watering the garden. It could be a very pleasant way to spend the long evenings but the midges make sure we don’t get too much pleasure out of this simple chore. They’re vicious insects, much worse than mozzies, and they terrorize the population all the summer. Right now they’re all at their worst and we’re carrying several ‘wounds’ as reminders of their presence.

We have both been here long enough now to have experience of all the four seasons. Each has its own particular beauty – the cold conditions seem to bring out very deep and brilliant colours in the autumn: winter frost and snow transform the landscape into a wonderland of white: spring is an ‘ocean’ of fresh greens, colourful wildflowers and myriads of daffodils in paddocks, on roadsides, in gardens – everywhere; summertime, unlike the drying off and brownness of southern hemisphere summer, here there is a profusion of green and growth and (hopefully) not too many rainy days.