A recent winter Sunday afternoon, as the gold light slanted, with all the glory of a Monet, to warm my back as I weeded, I paused to listen to the delightful sounds of my children playing in the garden around me.

I turned my face to the sun and put aside the flash of worry about the fate of the planet, as 25 degrees of winter heat gloriously shone down in the middle of August.

My eldest child stood on one foot, like a water bird with her suddenly stretched legs, eating a leaf of sorrel that she had plucked from the plant seconds before.

My littlest appeared to be eating something also, which may well have been a worm, perhaps equally nutritious, and while less appealing to me, he seemed delighted.