In late November, I went to London for the premiere of Scenes from the Wild, a song cycle inspired by Dara McAnulty and his remarkable Diary of a Young Naturalist. Appropriately, perhaps, for the diary of an autistic teen who finds meaning in the raw power of nature, it was the day Storm Arwen made landfall. My journey home, late at night, was a comedy of cancelled trains and driving icy rain.

Later, in December, it was my privilege to chair an online event for Norfolk Wildlife Trust's Cley Calling Festival. Featuring Dr Alex Bond of the Natural History Museum, author and journalist Anita Sethi, Dr Stuart Butchart of BirdLife International and the Urban Birder, David Lindo, the panel discussed equality of access to natural spaces and to careers in nature conservation.

As the first lockdown began, in late March 2020, innumerable cracks in our society were exposed. Despite the worry and disruption, and so much loss, many of us in Norfolk had it fairly easy. The weather was absurdly warm for March and April; and - here's the rub - most of us had ready access to the natural world.

At dawn each day, I would slip from my bed and step with excitement into the lives of birds. Even before I left my house I could hear the urgent notes of great tits and of chiffchaffs clamouring to breed. On the duckpond by my door, the year's first bobbly ducklings twirled behind their mottled mothers. And just beyond the common - past the happy clatter of a chaffinch from the birches - I would slip into a corridor of blackthorns, not yet in leaf but all a-froth with flowers. Here a blackcap sang and I was safe.

One morning, a badger trotted blithely past my doorstep and, once, a white-tailed eagle (a known bird from the Isle of Wight) flew over, hounded by a buzzard, as I read among the flowers and bees which fill my little garden. To have a garden full of flowers, in lockdown, was a peerless blessing in itself. For that garden to be on a village common, by a river, along an abandoned railway line, in leafy Norfolk, was a greater blessing still.

To know a little of the language of the natural world is a blessing too. Though species' names and scientific snippets are not the point, the simple fact of growing up with access to the coast and countryside, with adults around who were comfortable taking children out, has been the greatest privilege of my life. I learned in childhood that I had a place - a voice - outdoors. That I was welcome in wild spaces, and among the people and organisations which manage them.

Each one of us has known the agony of wanting to fit in without knowing how. Children of older generations might remember being left to struggle in school because letters, words or numbers made no sense to them. Others felt the shame of being picked last for sports teams week after miserable week.

Imagine - for one moment - feeling the same sense of not belonging in the outdoors, in wild spaces, and in nature. Imagine dearly wanting to explore a nature reserve, but feeling that people like you would be unwelcome, or that no one else would look or sound like you. Imagine having grown up not knowing what a stinging nettle was; and how that missing knowledge might affect your exploration of the landscape. Millions of people in our country - for reasons of health, geography, prejudice, migration, neurodivergence, gender, wealth and education - don't feel safe or welcome in the countryside, or perhaps might feel exposed or foolish if they attempted to explore it.

As residents of Norfolk - with brent geese burbling round our coast, grey seals hauled out on our beaches and hares in almost every field - we might laugh that people find wild places daunting. We might laugh; or equally we might reflect that nature is the equal birthright of everyone in society and resolve to make Norfolk's nature spaces welcoming.

Imagine never having witnessed winter's end in an early April brimstone. Imagine never having heard the exuberant whinnying of wigeon, the shrill keening of a buzzard. Imagine never having wandered through a bluebell wood and smelled its heady sweetness. Imagine never having touched a gelatinous ball of frogspawn in the bitter water of a pond in March.

Deprived of these experiences, would you care so much about the natural world? Would your life be half as rich? I wager that almost all of us feel joy on seeing spring's first primrose; awe on hearing waves of pinkfeet pouring to their roost. We are amused by bank voles, thrilled by banded demoiselles jigging across our rivers, and haunted by the soulful note of curlews in our marshes.

Why shouldn't everyone have a life so rich? A connection with the landscape which is just as strong? Why shouldn't everyone be a friend to nature and an ally in the fight for conservation? If we are to preserve what is left of our ancient landscape and our biodiversity - against the tide of tarmac, cement, development, drainage, pesticide and effluent - we need every member of society beside us; each person - regardless of background, advantage or minority - equally in love with nature, and equally prepared to stand for her.

At Norfolk Wildlife Trust we are committed to making our nature reserves, our visitor centres, our events and our workplaces truly welcoming and accessible to everyone. We believe that Norfolk's nature - both in our care and elsewhere across the county - is for everyone. And we know that together - diverse voices speaking with a common will - we are powerful to protect it for the future.

For, as Dara says in his beautiful book: 'This is the music of our ancestors too, waves in one ear, wren siblings in the other. A two-track stereo. The sound of natural things that influence every other thing, whether we know it or not.'