Normally I\u2019d follow it, tracking its scattery path, willing it to land. But\u00a0not here. Not on Court 5. Not on\u00a0break point.<\/p>\n
The Community Sport Centre at Roehampton, the Wimbledon-qualifying venue, isn\u2019t butterfly habitat. Not like Barnes Common, which was teeming with little flutterers when I made my way from the station. Here the habitat is human-oriented: tents, green canvas, the evocative plock of ball on string. But then butterflies can turn up anywhere.<\/p>\n
A flash of movement, a glitch in the matrix. It skitters about in that unpredictable way they have, a sandy orange scrap on a zigzag path. Painted lady. Lot of them about this year<\/a>.<\/p>\n Butterflies \u2013 high summer on the wing \u2013 lift the casual observer\u2019s heart in a way that other insects don\u2019t. Never mind their unmatched ferocity when defending their patch \u2013 they\u2019re pretty, and they neither swarm nor bite. Butterflies<\/a> are fine with us.<\/p>\n This painted lady I\u2019m watching flirts with the server\u2019s head. Imagine this on Centre Court, SW19. The player pulls out of their serve. Andrew Castle says something annoying. Mirth is unconfined.<\/p>\n There are no such shenanigans here \u2013 but the painted lady heralds a flurry of activity. Three small whites float around, apparently aimless in the sweltering heat. A tiny orange pair appear briefly, their flight paths intertwining. A true lepidopterist would know them instantly from the flight style and general impression; I hazard a guess at small copper and leave it at that, content enough with the sighting.<\/p>\n No sooner have they fluttered out of view than a blue-green stealth bullet zips across my sightline, as if rebuking the butterflies for their lack of speed and manoeuvrability. Emperor dragonfly, like a British hopeful in the 1990s, no sooner seen than gone.<\/p>\n A clean winner down the line elicits an ooh of excitement. I want to draw everyone\u2019s attention to the aeronautical miracle that\u2019s just whizzed past. But there\u2019s a time and place for everything. So I give a small internal cheer, and settle in\u00a0for the second set.<\/p>\n