The Obsessive Gardener
Can you resist weeding and just sit in your garden deck-chair ?
Ok, I confess, just take those secuteurs away from my precious skimmia bush. I am an obsessive gardener and have been for as long as I can remember. I blame it on my father and my surrogate grandmother both of whom instilled in me a love of growing things at an early age. I refuse to accept treatment though, I don't want to be cured.
I bet you know at least one obsessive gardener. I often wonder if there is any other species of gardener. They're the sort of people who take slips from neighbours' gardens when you're out for a walk with them. They cannot physically pass a garden centre (even if it is closed). They fight off repeated attacks by vermin on their compost heaps with increasingly gestapo-esque fortifications (you know who you are) but don't think for even one moment of giving the heap the heave-ho. They trade pest stories over dinner.
I used to think I was just a keen gardener because I thought it was normal to beg car-driving friends to help me move my numerous collection of heavy terracotta pots to my latest rental accommodation rather than be parted from my plants. But since I've acquired my own garden (sorry, I mean, our garden, darling) the disease has become virulent. I nip out for five minutes in the morning before my commute to work to just pull a few weeds. One hour later my suit is covered in grass stains, my shoes are filthy, and I'm late for work.
My niece recently pointed out to me that I seem to love getting my fingernails encrusted with muck when gardening. I wondered if it was a childhood need to get muddy resurfacing but although that would be a neat explanation I don't truly believe it. There is just something satisfying about feeling the soil in your hands, assessing its moisture content and crumbling its fecundity. Plus I never remember to wear my gloves except when I am pruning something thorny. Anyhow, by the end of the day I had her totally muddy as well so I think I won that particular argument and gained a willing assistant in the process. It was a humbling experience to be in the position of garden yedi-master rather than student for the first time. Gardening books are all very well (and I possess one or two, ahem) but there's nothing like another gardener showing you how to do things.
Weather is a great test of how obsessive you are about gardening. Do you garden in the dark like a child reluctant to be called in from playing with friends on a Summer evening ? Have you ever gardened in the rain ? I love watching the audience of BBC's 'Ground Force' programme when it starts to bucket down. Of course some of the male viewers love that because of the charming Charlie Dimmock, but most will start to squirm at the mere idea of continuing to garden regardless of flooded paths, dripping hair, and soaking clothes. Only the obsessive gardeners will point out that those plants needed to be in the ground before nightfall.
Weather forecasts are of a different importance for passionate gardeners. We despair of prolonged dry weather, can tell you exactly when the last Spring frost occurred and follow cold fronts like Met Office junkies. We venture out in the fog, snow, hail, and brimstone to rescue our most vulnerable plants. Last August I was due to escape a wet Summer in Dublin for my Summer holidays in Turkey. I gardened late into the dark attempting to prepare my precious plants for my departure, did some hasty packing and collapsed into the land of Nod. We had to leave for the airport at 6am, so I got up at 4.30am.
Let that sink in for a moment as I explain that I am not a morning person by any stretch of the most elastic imagination. Any waking time before 6am simply does not exist in my lexicon. Crowbars and buckets of water have to be applied to get me out of my bed before 6am.
So, I repeat. I jumped from my slumber nest at 4.30am to the stunned look of disbelief from the other half. Not to do any last minute packing. Not to locate my passport from the disaster zone that is my bookshelves. No, I got up in order to plant out the last of my sweetpea seedlings because I knew they wouldn't survive my absence otherwise. Now that is dedication. They were happily flowering when I returned home, by the way.
I read advice recently saying that every writer should have a small patch of garden to tend as a means of calming the mind and helping them through blocked stories. It was advised that this verdant inspiration should be spread beneath your desk window. Ha ! What an idea ! If that were true then I would never write again. I would be outside all the time. No, I need heavy velvet blinds to block the view and maybe a potted plant if I can resist the temptation to be watering it all the time.
Any obsessive gardener can spend hours just pottering around the garden. When outsiders review the results, you would never know that the gardener had been out there at all, but that isn't the point. Hey we even like cleaning out the old pots at the end of the season, raking moss from the lawn, and gathering leaves. Autumnal gardening is my favourite in fact. The garden smells so fertile and full of promise at this time of year. The showy plants have died back, a few sturdy friends are doing their best to provide some colour and for once I can see the overall form of the garden and think about how to change its shape. Last Autumn's task was removing invasive ivy and thorn-bushes from the back wall. Not a pretty task at the best of times but it was exceedingly theraputic. I would recommend ivy-removal for anybody in need of some stress-relief. Just be prepared for the asthma-inducing dust, the big hairy hidden spiders and the evil two inch pcyhanthus thorns puncturing your hands impervious to the heaviest pruning gloves available.
Gardening is a healthy obsession, I can assure you. Of course you bleed, curse, pull your back and drop large rocks on your feet, but it's a calming thing. Honest. Except when the darn slugs eat your plants. I take that very personally and despite being a vegetarian for the last 12 years I delight in disposing of the wee devils, sometimes you just have to abandon your ethics in the potting shed. On the left of the seed catalogues, above the forgotten gloves, and under the bandages.
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Copyright Grace Tierney, 2003