We have a largeish and somewhat feral garden, always an overgrown mess; that I greatly appreciate - but, despite theoretically liking the idea, I need firmly to be pushed into gardening it.
This pushing my wife does; by buying large numbers of flowers and runner beans, pots of many sizes, and the compost to fill them (she enjoys this kind of shopping. I do not); and then leaving them around until my compassion for the desiccating plants compels me to do the needful.
Once they have been potted, we arrange them in suitable places; then it is down to me to water them every couple of days for four or five months, and periodically cut-off the dead geranium heads to keep them blooming.
We both pick, and the family eat, the runner beans - or, what remains after the slugs have done their worst; and my wife freezes any surplus we can't eat.
So, although these activities are pretty limited compared to what we could and should be doing; for a reluctant gardener, I spend a fair bit of time doing it.
And, although I make a point of grumbling, I enjoy the process - particularly watering the plants on a warm dry evening; which I find to be a highly spiritual and enchanting business.
This Whitsun (Pentecost) weekend looks to be very dry and warm - and because Monday is a national holiday; the roads will be choked with traffic, and the all the "attractions" (such as stately homes, or pretty villages and seaside places) will be chock-a-block.
So; the plan is to spend a lot of time in the garden - where there is plenty to do; indeed still a couple of dozen sadly pot-bound flowers seeking a more permanent home, and a tray of beetroots wanting a few feet of bedding.
It is rather a pleasing prospect!
But that won't stop me grumbling.
A husband should always grumble when his wife gets him to do something he secretly enjoys. Otherwise she might realize he enjoys it and stop asking him!
ReplyDeleteAnd, of course, he loses the kudos if she realizes he enjoys it!
ReplyDelete@Mal - Such cynicism from one so young...
ReplyDeleteGardening is legitimately miserable where I live but for some reason everyone keeps trying. I tend to say I hate gardening in general, but once we were subway commuters in a moderate climate and had a backyard garden, and I remember declining after-work social events saying “Sorry, I need to get home to my plants.”
ReplyDeleteEven there, where gardening was easy, we lost everything either to slugs or to high wind, though the “loss” was not really a loss because I decided to pickle all the green cherry tomatoes and to this day they are one of the best foods I ever made (certainly the best canned food I ever made). I guess our flowers did ok but I never got the hang of pruning. We had a blueberry bush- birds ate every one and pooped them on our car. We tended a potted lemon for years and moved away before getting any fruit.
Bah! Maybe I do hate gardening.
@Mia - I hate slugs. I had nurtured a baby beans for weeks, then a slug ate off its growing tip last night.
ReplyDeleteAfter writing the above about slugs, my wife and I went out in the dark with a torch and, working as a team, picked-off and liquidated 15 of them, hand-picked off the nascent beans.
ReplyDeleteTip - if you have them, wear surgical gloves to handle slugs - slug slime is very difficult to get off your fingers.