Busy as bees, my mother would have said, and while it’s just one of those many, many utterances I never questioned, it occurs to me now that maybe ants are busier, or possibly even hummingbirds. While the former’s diligent application to the task in hand – do ants have hands? – was a perennial concern on childhood summer picnics, my only experience of the latter was of dusty stuffed specimens in the local museum, where the only other exhibits I recall were a polar bear, a skeleton, the skis belonging to a famous explorer, and a selection of scrimshaw trinkets fashioned by prisoners or sailors in order to keep themselves busy. I vividly remember a scene at the guillotine, with tiny figures and splashes of red added to blade and basket. It repelled and intrigued me in equal measures, speaking so eloquently of a barbaric past that was nonetheless close enough to breathe on my chilly neck. I never considered it a grim harbinger, yet here we are, balancing the mouton, oiling the déclic, and angling the bascule just so, while the queue stretches to the vanishing point like a discredited UKIP poster. I miss my mother every day, though I’m glad she’s not around to see this. Move along, move along. There’s a heavy day stretching ahead, and we’ll all be busy as bees.
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Oz Hardwick
Picture Nick Victor
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