Here endeth our annual gardening weekend

Like all the other suburban lemmings we have spent the May Day Bank Holiday in the garden and the garden centre.  It is now customary for us to declare that this year will be the one when we do something with the garden. (As were the previous three years). 

So as usual we have bought seeds which will never flower (indeed are realistically not even going to germinate, either because we fail to plant them, or even if we do plant them, we will fail to water them or even if they survive all of that, they will disappear into the weed infested jungle that is our garden and never be seen again). 

We have also bought plants, some of which, astonishingly, we have actually planted instead of enjoying the sight of them dying expensively in their pots.  We have strawberry plants (any fruit is traditionally eaten by the birds rather than us, assuming that the squirrels don't dig up every single one first), runner beans and tomato plants, all of which could be purchased much more cheaply and with far less effort at the greengrocers. And of course the girls have a packet of sunflower seeds.  To add to last year's unopened packet.  This really is the triumph of hope over experience.

Today I have dug up several sacks of ground elder, discovered the steps to the top of the garden (but only after a serious archaeological excavation) and found a very beautiful azalea (I knew we had one last year but couldn't find it this year) buried beneath several feet of sedge (poetic only if you are John Keats, that particular plant).  As a result, I ache in every inch of my body and can't wait to get back to my desk tomorrow.

Was there ever such an odd hobby as gardening?  It's hard physical work, mind-numbingly repetitive, demands incredible patience and is undone the moment your back is turned.  Reading is far superior.  Books don't un-read themselves and disappear page by page every time you put them back on the shelf.  But even as I sit here, I know that the ground elder is furtively edging its way back above ground, the buttercups are creeping and the sedge is, well, doing whatever sedges do in order to achieve world supremacy. 

Anyway, I've done as much in the garden this weekend as I do every other year and that's that. 

Comments

[Stefanie]

Gardening is great! Do you have mosquitoes as big as birds that you have to deal with too? Our garden binge will happen this Friday. I can hardly wait :)

[Sandra]

Giant slugs yes, mosquitos no. The warm weather of the weekend has disappeared now so I'm even less inclined to venture out.