Category: Blog

What a beautiful start to my day. I had decided that the best way to cope with a super hot day was to treat it like a day on holiday in the Med.

I woke early and could already feel it was going to be a hot day by the warmth of the breeze that was wafting across my bed. Dressing for a holiday day is a simple affair…..fling on a cool linen dress, sandals and a hat…..ready to go. Breakfast can be a treat bought on the way to the garden.

All was quiet on the street…..maybe folk are staying home today. The shops were all shuttered still except for the bakers …perfect…a croissant for breakfast……and the Turkish market which is open all night. The night staff squinting in the bright light as they stepped outside for a sneaky fag and a natter with their colleague who was just starting to set up the water melon stand.

It was a languid walk to the garden…..no hurry….enjoy….brush the crumbs off my frock….smile. Brush the crumbs off my chin. I bumped into so many friends coming in the opposite direction…’Morning Vivi, you off to the garden?’……’Morning Vivi, beautiful day isn’t it?’…….’Morning Vivi, you off to water?’…..’Morning Vivi, you’ve got crumbs on your chin’…..

By the time I got to the gate, the big chain which locks it was already hot to touch. Once through the gate there is a brief moment of shade and coolness from the trees before I step back into the bright light and the crunchy straw like grass underfoot. It is pin-drop quiet. Even the parakeets have ceased their chatter.

So hot already. So bright already. Yes, this feels like a holiday day. I can’t see anyone else at first…….but I can hear water tanks gurgling as they refill……I can hear cans clanging against the sides of the tanks. And then I start to see them……fellow gardeners lovingly pouring water on their precious plants……I don’t so much see them as see their hats bobbing up and down amongst the growth.

As I arrive in my garden cats start to appear from shady spots…..lazily stretching before they come to great me. They can hardly be bothered……I think the cats are having a holiday day too. They follow me to the shed then promptly flop on the grass and start snoozing again. They have the right idea. I sit for a while…….just looking, listening…..grinning. Yes, dear cats, we’re on holiday.

I take my time with the watering. I splash my feet a few times and it feels delicious. Sometimes I remove the roses from the cans and slip them into the pockets on my dress (a dress MUST have pockets)…..they leak a bit and make my pockets soggy……I can feel it on my thighs…it’s lovely and I think about filling my pockets with water….

I greet the pants as I water them and chuckle to myself to imagine them saying ‘thank you’ for the drink. They look happy. They are growing.

I pop the cans back in the shed and sit again, this time on the deck. I can see the hats are starting to leave. There are hands waving from behind bushes and a chorus of ‘bye Vivi, stay cool’….. I have the entire garden to myself. I don’t want to leave. I start counting butterflies on the lavender……I immediately lose count and laugh to myself.

But it’s getting hotter by the minute and I know I ought to go home. I step out of this beautiful, quiet, secret place and back into the High street……..the shops are all open now……folk are out and being busy before the real heat comes. Shopping bags are bursting….there’s a huge queue at the Post Office already……the flower stall is spreading it’s fragrance across the road…..and then the overwhelming fragrance of water melon. The water melon stall is doing a roaring trade…….I stand in the shade and watch for a few moments…….as fast as he can cut them into quarters and wrap them they are selling……water melon juice is trickling across the pavement……where the pavement comes out of shade the juice dries instantly. Black seeds on grey flagstones.

Yes, this feels like a holiday day. Later I shall read a little……or maybe snooze a little, a siesta……and as I drift off I shall picture fresh, juicy tomatoes and cool cucumbers……and imagine the taste of tangy feta…… Yes, I can be blissful even on the hottest of days

If I had known, last year, what I know now would I have done things differently? Possibly. Probably not. A few tweaks here and there but nothing major. This time last year I was just grateful to be in the garden at all…..with my little broken wings……I had no idea I was on a course for making a huge decision. The fact that I wouldn’t do things differently gives me confidence; over the last couple of years my little patch of soil has shown me it can feed me and nurture me and keep me whole.

This time of year is known as the ‘hungry gap’: the time when last year’s harvests have been eaten and this year’s are yet to grow. I have, by trial and error, over a few years, learned how to keep myself going over winter……with the stored produce and the veggies I can keep going in the ground during the cold months. It is about this time of year when I go through the cupboards, the freezer, the shed to work out what’s left and what I can make from it……

So……it is this time of year, once more, when I take stock of what’s left, what goodies there are to be turned into meals:……..but I find, as I weigh the beans and count the onions and clock the bottles of toms and eyeball the squash…..that I am quietly crying…….I stop in my tracks. I’m actually really crying and I can’t turn off the tears, the little sobs catch in my throat. ……I realise, I am taking stock not of my veggies….but of my life. I slump on the kitchen chair, nursing my tears and slowly I begin to see it…….. I have been in a ‘hungry gap’ for years…….my belly has been full, but my soul has been depleted…to the point of starvation. I am empty, totally drained….and empty.

I no longer know who I am. The little moments in the kitchen garden have kept a tiny heartbeat going…..but I don’t want a tiny heartbeat…..I want a thump, thump, thumping beat. So I have decided to follow my heart….with it’s quiet little beat. I have decided to feed my soul. I have decided to look after myself for a while. I have decided to let the kitchen garden look after me this year……and walk away from the job I love but which doesn’t love me back.

I don’t know what I will do or what will happen next……but I know whatever it is that I will give it my all and I will find myself again. I know that I will be living true to myself. I know that the sun on my cheeks, the air in my hair, the buzz of insects, the beautiful flashes of colour in the garden…..the company, the tea, the thrill of the harvest, the smell of damp soil, the solitude, the birds that sing to me…….the simplicity of simply being…..will feed my soul and restore me.

The garden has it’s seasons……this is the season of newness, of life, of growth. We all feel it. After many springs my spring has finally come and I will grow once more………I hope your spring is happening for you too and that you find a way to fill your ‘hungry gap’.

A couple of days ago, as I was swishing my way down the hill towards my kitchen garden (swishing is my word for walking fairly quickly, with purpose but also with a carefree air), and humming a tune to myself that was not a tune I or anybody else would know but which somehow came out alright, I thought to myself ‘gosh, I do love this time of year’……and I carried on swishing and humming until a few moments later I said it to myself again ‘oh, I really do love this time of year’…….hum, hum, hum I went……swish, swish, swish I went until, in a sort of Winnie-the-Pooh moment, I stopped in my tracks and thought, ‘hang on a minute… I said this last month……..and the month before……and I’m pretty certain I said it last January’…… and so it was that I spent the rest of my swishing time trying, very hard, to think about which time I actually do love….

……and I decided that it is possible to love all the times. The garden is ever changing and as each change creeps in, I see new things, experience new excitement, feel new pleasures. The summer was beautiful……I appreciated every sun soaked, lazy, dreamy, languid moment…..but just as I was about to be complacent….about to snooze and dream some more the garden shook itself into a new phase. Someone flicked a switch. The evening darkness came quickly and the morning air had a bite to it. I had to put on a jumper. And when I looked at my little patch of soil I saw that it was bursting with gorgeous vegetables…..ripe from all the sun, fat from all the growing, tall from all the sunlight……somehow, overnight, it had become harvest time. So, snug in the aforementioned jumper, I have come to terms with the passing of summer and have started to harvest in earnest…..

…..in recent weeks I have spent more time in the kitchen than in the garden. I pod until midnight…..I bottle until midnight…..I chop, I blanch, I freeze….
.it does become a labour of love……but I know that come the new year I will be so glad I put the work in when I cook up another week’s worth of food from my stored veg…and snub the supermarkets. And even in deepest winter there will be fresh food to harvest and munch on. So I really do love this time of year…it’s hard work…..harder than any other time of the year…but the way I see it is my garden has worked hard for me until now so what’s a bit of effort on my side?

So I answered my own Winnie-the-Pooh conundrum……I love all the times of year in my kitchen garden……in different ways and for different reasons….and I will swish to the garden whether it’s high summer or deep midwinter…..a-swishing I will go.

The garden never stands still……it renews itself over and over…..and each time it renews itself I feel a renewal in myself. Happy swishing to you all……and love every minute.

Life is like a tapestry…..it is made of many, many threads……and it is only when all these threads are in one place and secure do we feel whole. There are so many colours, so many textures…..sometimes we drop a thread, a strand…..and we feel the gap that it creates…….my kitchen garden has become the warp into which I thread all my other strands.

See…here is the work thread…..it is a jolly colour…..which fades a little in places when things don’t work out well, when the day becomes too sad…….but the thread, like me, even when I feel spent, remains strong and never threatens to break……. And there is the family thread, the colour always changing…sometimes there are ‘bobbles’ on the thread…..but it, too, is always there.

If you look closely at the tapestry you may see occasional specks of gold…..these are my dreams, my fantasies, that ‘what if’s’….my tapestry is strewn with them. There are a couple of holes in it too…..the relationships that didn’t quite turn out as hoped….

…..but throughout the weave there is a garden….my garden…the garden. I did not know, when I was younger and thought I would marry a prince and ride horses every day, that my garden would be my main thread, my warp. But so it has become. I think my grandparents were the first to dangle this wee strand in front of me…….it has since become my strength and my solace. My garden and all the nature within it have become a place where I play out all my metaphorical hopes…….it is the place to which I return when my real dreams are dashed. My thoughts frequently return to this thread and, as time goes on, I realise how (if not why) it has become so important to me.

It is the last day of September, the weather is balmy, it is harvest time. I sit at the desk in my attic room with the window flung wide. It has gone midnight and I am listening to Argentine tango music (another thread is the music)…….I write…..a breeze drifts across my shoulders…….I listen…I reflect…..I could be anywhere right now……and then…..another little speck of gold dust appears on my tapestry as I fantasise about my dream garden……the garden is my one constant (in it’s ever changing way)……the garden will always be there for me……

Tonight, in this late, unseasonably warm air, I will dance a Tango whilst spraying gold dust on my tapestry…….and tomorrow I will dig and harvest and be joyful.

May all your gardens be part of your tapestries. And may they be littered with gold dust.

 

 

I love summer. Absolutely, completely love it. I love to feel the air and the sun on my skin, I love the feel of damp morning grass under my bare feet. I love how sounds carry on the warm air; children playing in the paddling pool in the park next door, hints of radio drifting from someone’s shed, the clinking of cutlery as lunch is prepared, al fresco, in one of the neighbouring houses, the pop of a cork and the giggles that go with it.

I love that summer days seem endless; even after a siesta the day has plenty enough left to stretch into a beautiful, long, languid evening. Summer is when I feel most me. Summer is when I feel optimistic and happy  from the moment I wake up to the moment I reluctantly close my eyes on another perfect day. Summer is about tranquility and life and love and being carefree once again…..

Summers are for going to the south of France for a week and accidentally staying for 2 months because of a boy with dusky, olive skin and a mop of hair bleached blonde by the sun and sea. Summers are for holding hands and waiting patiently for that first kiss……a kiss tinged with the taste of the sea….. In the summer sun there is no need to hurry anything, no need to wear shoes or be encumbered by layers of clothes…..no need to brush the sea salt out of one’s hair, no need to look at the clock. In the heat and the sun time stops.

A peace descends on the kitchen garden; all the hard work was done in the spring…all the hurrying and dashing…all the sowing and pricking, the transplanting and the tying and staking…it has all been done. And now……now the summer is here and the air is thick with sticky stillness; all around me is stillness. I am alone….but for the insects and even they seem to be going more slowly…..the honey bees linger, drunk on nectar, the butterflies, like giddy girls on the pier, occasionally flash their brightly coloured knickers. I, too, become more still. This is the time for sitting……for daydreaming……..for moments of ennui. For remembering. A la recherche du temps perdu. It is a time for simply being. I spend hours and hours and hours in the garden doing absolutely nothing….and I long to do it all again tomorrow.

Only when there is no light left to see by do I think about going home. And later, when I lay on my bed, drifting off, I can smell the sun on my skin and the breeze in my hair…… and my mind becomes as peaceful as my garden and all my memories flood back….

Oh summer! I am already nostalgic for you.