'Willow warblers...are amazing little birds: so small, such courageous travellers, so sweet a voice, such fierce competitors. It is when you can hear the first willow warbler of the spring and know it for what it is that you have passed the point of no return. You have finished and revelled in chapter three of Ulysses. You have become a birdlistner. You are committed. And once you have done that, you know a lifetime of pleasure lies before you. Once you have cracked the willow warbler, you're a goner.'
The above is a quote from Simon Barnes' wonderful book 'birdwatching with your eyes closed.'
Yesterday evening, we took a slow walk over the iron age hillfort and across Halkyn Common, laughing at lambs lounging in the late sun, gulping air filled with the lettucey taste of new grass. We stopped abruptly, looked at each other, cocked our heads on one side and grinned; huge grins that spread across our faces until there was almost no room left. There was no mistaking that sweet scale-tumbling song. The willow warblers are back safely from Africa.
It didn't go unnoticed that this moment of joy came on a day of harrowing news reports of the plight of human migrants.
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