There are two signs that you have had a good time in the garden. The first is a grubby nose on a freshly washed pup. I love that he loves being in the garden as much as I do and while we are still learning garden manners, he is for the most part a delightfully addition to my garden. He likes to smell my hands when they are covered in dirt. As I watched him do this, I wondered what stories he is learning from the soil. After quick hellos he heads off to attend do urgent garden business of beating up an empty pot and wrestling sticks. The other two dogs check in less often. Eos likes to sunbath at the bottom of the front steps. Atlas sits, guarding in a newfound quiet as he is starting to go deaf. We frequently loose him in the undergrowth when he wanders off which has resulted in a find my keys tag attached to his collar to save me endlessly calling him. There was debate about if it was just him ignoring me.
The second sign of a good time in the garden is when you close your eye, images of plants and ideas for your garden drift into your mind. This weekend when I close my eyes, images of flowers that are starting to emerge in the garden would dance into my mind. There is the newly flowering lilac, freshly picked for the kitchen table even though there are only a few branches of it flowering. The season is short and the scent a favourite, I selfishly want to enjoy every ounce of it this season. It sits in a vase tangled with jasmine. I see the pink rosemary flowering with bees seeking out its nectar. The ranunculus that are starting emerge. I try and contain my excitement.
Inspiration for the garden comes from ideas I see in books. After an hour or so in the garden on Saturday afternoon, I fell into a gardening book, something I haven’t done in a while. I’ve realised words for me are a form of rest, a chance to escape to another place away from the day to day. I am calling it “resting in words” and have decided I need to do more of it. There is a delicious feeling when you are finally relaxed enough to let go and just be absorbed by a sentence or two. After an hour or so in the garden I finally felt relaxed enough to do so. “Beyond the Meadows, Portrait of a natural and biodiverse garden’, was a late Autumn purchase and for whatever reason I put it aside come winter. I found myself as the remainder of the weekend unfolds, lost in inspiring images of a garden with an ethos that echoed my own.
“In many areas in the garden we needed time to understand the meaning they would have for us before we could start to design them accordingly - but for some this came naturally”
I read this and think, this is how I want to garden. While I am busy planting and creating new flower beds I reflect that there is a space where I have let things come to be naturally. My mind drifts to the garden situated at the bottom of the lawn. I created it last year, throwing in some things that I thought might like the dark corner of the garden. They are mostly white and fresh green in colour as I wanted to lift the darkness of this space with some light tones. I planted around a terracotta pot hellebores, some ferns, a few foxgloves and astranita Major. I gave it little thought but as the season unfolded it gave me something back. It found it’s direction in a natural way that come this season as I look to tidy up, I have very little to do. Maybe add some new things that have caught my eye, perhaps the seedling hellebore will do and wandering foxgloves. As I read, my eyes naturally close, is there nothing better than a mid-afternoon nap after you have garden and read. As I drifted off, the images and words of the books mixing with what I had seen in the garden today. Dreams are formed.