Artistic Farmers

I love living in France and perhaps more than that, I love living in the countryside. Of course, most of the charm of the countryside lies in  the fields and the crops growing in them. Who can resist the sight of a field of wheat all tender green as the new crop sprouts in the Spring?  Or the sight of the same crop, fully ripened by the sun and waving in the breeze ready for the combine? Or the field after `all has been safely gathered in` when the golden stubble is cut as evenly as a blonde crew-cut with just the bales of straw scattered haphazardly here and there?
  Or more exotic crops like the rows of vines lined up ready for trimming of the over-exuberant leaves   and the eventual harvest of the green or purple bunches often seen in our region. The farmers seem to take a delight in doing everything so regularly and precisely. I was even told the other day when looking at a newly-planted field of vines that the rows are positioned by GPS !
  And surely the French farmer has some exceptionally pretty crops! What could be more beautiful than a field of sunflowers? Or the paler yellow of the unfortunately-named oil-seed rape? In the spring we can see fields of bright blue which are the Alfalfa fodder crop or a duller mauve of hemp or flax. I am really coming to believe that the French farmer is a repressed artist, using his fields to paint an acres-wide canvas.

     To emphasize my theory, what do you think of this? Surely nobody could plant such a crop just to turn a mundane profit!
`Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty`. The farmers should be praised to the skies for the visual treats they give us!!


     Bye for now