I almost forgot I am a gardener. This is what happens when the Winter months set in, making everything wet and muddy, or you don’t want to be out in the gusty winds because for some reason gusty winds induce feelings of rage. However, we have been blessed with sunshine and warmth the last two or three days and, with today being the Spring Equinox (hurrah!) I took myself off to the greenhouse and sowed tomatoes, lupins, asters and geraniums. The greenhouse glass needs a good wash, but the spraying and dripping of water drives Nell into a frenzy of wild excitement and I cannot be doing with that shrill barky hoo-ha. The greenhouse bath will have to wait until she out for a walk with Himself, Lord Andrew of Malarkey.
I spent a majority of the day gardening apart for an hour and a half break for a scheduled Zoom meeting with my course tutor, and a spot of lunch. I set myself four gardening tasks because I find I can get more done with less injury to myself if I rotate three or four activities. Proper ‘green gym’ approach. You wouldn’t go into a standard gym and use just one piece of equipment, would you? You’d rotate, wouldn’t you? I am saying this like I know this stuff, and like I go to the gym but I don’t and never will because gyms smell weird and you spend a lot of time exerting energy in a quite boring and pointless fashion. I’d rather the garden as my gym. I shall stop saying ‘gym’ now because the very thought is making me queasy.
My four tasks, then, were:
1) mowing of the middle lawn - aerobic
2) clearing out the crud in the grouting between the patio slabs - strength
3) moving loads of logs and tree branches into the woodshed - biceps. The logs and tree branches were crushing my primroses. Not a euphemism.
4) clearing moss and Winter debris off the laundry roof - climbing skills and not falling off the roof skills
I also decided to put the garden table and chairs back on the patio. They have been stored away for the Winter. They required a spot of brain workout to reconstruct them and a bit of brute force because the fourth leg of the table decided to be difficult and wouldn’t go back in its hole. But I did it because I will NOT be beaten by a stupid table.
Nell helped with most of these activities apart from the lawn mowing. She doesn’t like the lawn mower. I don’t much like it either but I’m better at pushing it than she is. She supervised my patio cleaning by staring at me as if to say, ‘Isn’t life too short to worry about crud in your grouting?’ She also came up onto the laundry roof with me. I am pretty certain she was plotting how to get into next door’s garden which would be so easy, if only she had a parachute. She thought the moving of the logs and tree branches would be enhanced by her standing on them. I said it wasn’t helping at all, so she mooched off to do a bit of squirrel patrol.
All in all, a very satisfying day! The Gardening Season of 2025 is launched.
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KJ