The WordPress photo challenge this week is ‘Beloved’.
I don’t think the humans in my life whom I love would be happy for me to plaster their images all over the blogosphere. I have no pets, beloved or otherwise. So I’ll have to look a little further.
Here’s a little miscellany of images, beloved images:
- The Yorkshire Dales, whose rolling hills, bisected by ancient drystone walls I missed so much during our years in France.
- The Pyrenees, from their richly flowered springtime meadows through to winter, when their rocky slopes are covered in deep snow, and which I now miss every single day. I’ll miss the shared picnics on our walks together, when our French friends pooled resources, and we ate everybody’s offerings of home-cured sausage, local cheeses, bread, home-baked cakes together with wine and somebody’s grandfather’s very special eau de vie.
- Springtime daffodils. Every year I go into deep mourning when they wither, die and finally become untidy heaps of dying leaves. I’m happier now as they thrust their sheathed stems through the hard soil, promising to flower soon- but not quite yet.
- There are books: I need a pile beside my bed to get me through the night.
- A single, perfect cup of coffee from Bean and Bud in Harrogate.
- Skeins of geese flying overhead mark the seasons here, and I love their haunting, raucous cries.
- And so on….
The Pyrenees seen from St. Julien de Gras Capou in summertime.
A shared picnic near Montaillou, in March.
The Nidderdale Way.
Near Pateley Bridge.
We’ve already seen our first daffodils in North Stainley this year.
Just a random pile of books. I don’t think I’ve read most of these.
Our beloved Bean and Bud,
Geese flying uncharacteristically untidily over Marfield Wetlands.
I’ll end though with this. I wasn’t beloved of this elephant in Kumbakonam, Tamil Nadu, who was only doing his job when I visited him ten years ago on my Indian Adventure. But I felt beloved and very special when he raised his trunk and brought it down upon my shoulder – his very distinctive way of blessing me.
Click on any image to see a slideshow of the photos, full-size.
From Pyrenees to Pennines 
Very clever to make a slide show from your photographs, I thoroughly enjoyed them all. I love snow and mountains so my favourite was the picnic.
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Can you imagine the pleasure of such a feast with such a view?
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I would have been totally gobsmacked and wanted to stay there for ever and a day.
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A wonderfully eclectic journey through the notion of beloved. That photo of the geese is stunning. (I couldn’t help studying the titles on the pile of books and was suitably impressed and inspired. Then I noticed the caption! 😉 )
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This was a haul picked up at a charity shop trawl quite a few months ago. Actually, I have read quite a few, and passed them on to the next charity shop.
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What an excellent charity shop haul. I need to visit your charity shops!
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No no. These were seven shops in the same high street. Ramsbottom Lancashire if you’re asking.
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Such a nice interpretation of the theme! Your loves are simple and lovely and heart/soul warming. And the elephant could see you were special!
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Oh, I like to think so. Nothing to do with the tiny sum of money I offered to receive this blessing.
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Lovely post. It got me thinking about what is beloved by me. Books most certainly, and the beautiful Dales landscape. Chocolate would be there somewhere too! x
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Oh, I love chocolate too, so long as it’s bitter and dark, But beloved is going a bit far in my case. x
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A lovely interpretation. Cherished and treasured appear in the dictionary definition of beloved and you certainly covered that.
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Ah, thank you. You seem to be finding your new home pretty beloved already.
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What an interesting interpretation and collection of photos. The thought of being whacked on the shoulder by an elephant is something to ponder, did it hurt?
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Oh, he didn’t whack. It was so gentle. Rather special actually.
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Elephants are lovely. We saw a film at the Elephant Sanctuary in Malaysia of elephants being rescued from shrinking habitat. They often come by river on a raft and find it very stressful so they are accompanied by two “staff” elephants who stand on either side of the rescuee and wrap their trunks round it for comfort. It was very moving.
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What a really lovely story. Thanks for recounting it.
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An interesting miscellany of beloved places and facets to life that shouldn’t be taken for granted. Imagine life without coffee!
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I’d rather not, if it’s all the same to you 😦
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A good and thoughtful interpretation of ‘beloved’. The picnic up in the mountains must have been breathtaking! I never tire of views from tops of hills and mountains (and I chose to live in the flatlands just a few metres above sealevel!)
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Time to move house, Clare! I know your part of the country is lovely, but I do actually require hills. Mountains are even better.
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Ah no, I couldn’t move from here; I miss the wide skies too much when I’m away for any time. I’m just perverse!
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I do get that. But each to our own eh? Lucky we’re all different!
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Yes!
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I do get the countryside, geese and definitely the coffee, but there is something so special about a huge animal bestowing such a gesture on you. Truly wonderful and beloved. Lucky you.
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It was wonderful. And yes, I know it was his ‘job’. But still ….
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