Tag: gardening

Epiphany

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Pale mauve cyclamen flowers and variegated green leaves, shiny with rain, growing in wet ground.

The earth tips back and the light reaches back out to the north, stretches, spreads over us. The sun stays past four o’clock, just a little bit more than eight hours now. The solstice marked the turning point; now I begin to notice.

It’s cold, though. I walked out earlier, just a little way. My loose silky trousers, practical for a healing abdomen, are not so practical for a January walk; I am grateful for my brother’s long-ago recommendation of long-john base layers. I realised, half-way out, that my mind was singing me the enquiry of the Three Kings, the steady four-four of Mendelssohn’s setting keeping pace with my footsteps. Say, where is he born the king of Judea, for we have seen – for we have seen – have seen his star – have see-een his star and are co-ome to ado-ore him – have see-een his star and are co-ome to adore him… These Magi are walking, I think; it isn’t the swaying three-four camel-gait of We Three Kings. Too late, too slow, looking in the wrong place, but getting there in the end.

I caught a glimpse of the cathedral between two houses (you can see it from most places, if you look hard enough) and the flag on the west tower was streaming straight out in a rectangle, like a child’s drawing. The moon, just shy of a quarter, winked through a window of cloud and went away again. I turned, left it at my left shoulder, and turned back towards the sun, and into the wind.

In the garden, the cyclamen have bloomed: sturdy stems, delicate mauve flowers shaped like fantastic head-dresses springing from a rolled band, more outlandish than you’d see in any nativity play. I planted them under the most troublesome of the apple trees, hoping to introduce a little colour against that gloomy fence if nothing else. Suddenly, I’m vindicated.

December Reflections 2: flowers

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Plant with many flower heads, very dark purple, almost black, petals with a white edge. One of the flowers has a raindrop caught on one side, and the leaves and surrounding foliage are very green.

There were some extremely Christmassy flower arrangements in the cathedral a few weeks ago, I assume for the Christmas fair. Gold ribbon and poinsettia and all that sort of thing. Now, of course, they’re all gone, and we’re paying no attention to the huge tree in the corner. Such is the tension between secular Christmas and church Advent.

All this to say that my mind doesn’t go straight to ‘flowers’ on 2 December. But, as you see, there are a few still around. Apart from this delightfully Goth polyanthus, which feels appropriate to the season in colour scheme even if it’s flowering rather earlier than I expected, the French lavender in the front garden is still going, and in the back the Peruvian lilies haven’t given up yet.

I’m beginning to feel more equal to the garden, actually. Last week I finally chopped out the sixth and last dead box bush (devoured by beetles last year along with most of the rest of the country’s) and before that I’d pruned the fruit trees and trimmed the beeches back. There are still a load of wild strawberries to pull up, but it definitely feels like an improvement. Last year I had to get a man in to get it all under control. Worth every penny – but it feels so good to have been able to do it myself this time.

Not a year in a garden, but a garden in a year

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Close-up of a passion flower; behind it, a small but very green garden

When we moved into this house, the front garden was entirely covered in chips of purple slate. Now it is almost entirely covered in green.

I don’t have a proper ‘before’ photo, because the whole thing was so boring that I never bothered (and when I finally came to getting rid of slate and planting plants I had very limited time and other priorities).

Here you see the boringness relieved by a pot of tulips:

A tub of red and white streaked tulips (and one yellow one) on a floor of purple slate chippings with green weeds growing amongst them

You also see the irritating little weeds that grew among the stones. Shallow roots, but a pig to keep on top of and very obvious, at least when I didn’t have a magnificent tub of tulips to lead the eye elsewhere.

Last autumn, my maternity leave project (and I cannot at this distance think why I thought that this was a good idea) was transforming this into an actual garden, with intentional plants growing in the soil.

You might remember me asking on here for ideas of what to do with a small eastward facing plot that probably wasn’t going to get a lot of watering. A friend suggested that Mediterranean was the way to go. I’ve always loved herbs, so it didn’t take much effort to come up with a plan of rosemary against the house, lavender around the edges, and thyme as ground cover, with peonies (because what the hell, why not) to make the middle interesting. One of our bay trees (wedding present, 14 years ago) could go at the front corner, and what about an olive tree? And I was going to grow a passion flower up the railings.

I got Tony to gather up the slate chips (eventually a friend took them away to cover up a much less promising bit of ground). I ordered some plants from Thompson and Morgan, and quite a lot more from Norfolk Herbs. (I highly recommend Norfolk Herbs, by the way: their prices are extremely good and the delivery was swift.) On a whim, I threw some chamomile and bergamot into the order. The Thompson and Morgan stuff came in dribs and drabs; the Norfolk Herbs, all at once.

And every time I had a spare twenty minutes, when the baby had fed and gone to sleep deeply enough to notice that I’d handed her to someone else, I dashed out the front and put in another two or three plants. I’d leave the front window open so I’d hear when she started crying. I chucked a bulb or two in with each plant – tulips, daffodils, crocus, tête-à-tête, iris… Bit by bit, it got done.

A small garden plot with a few small bright green plants with purple slate chippings scattered on the earth between them

We didn’t get all the slate up first go. For a long time afterwards I was picking up a dozen chips and moving them to the edge every time I went out.

Then, of course, everything went dormant over the winter, and I had to wait to see what was going to happen next.

A small blue iris grows between purple slate chippings. In the background, tulip leaves are emerging.

The bulbs came first. A brave blue iris, then the tête-à-tête narcissi.

A small front garden dotted with emphatic yellow miniature daffodils

It was at this point that I started getting really happy with what I’d done. They cheered things up immensely.

On Mothering Sunday, I was presented with a pot of purple primulas. Those went in too.

Then the tulips flowered.

Red and white streaked tulips, looking rather scraggly among scraggly green herbs

Meanwhile, the herbs were beginning to get going. Come May, there was still quite a bit of earth showing between the plants, but they’d woken up. The bergamot, which I’d thought had maybe died, was very enthusiastic.

Lots of green plants of varying heights and textures, and hardly any purple slate chippings between them.

We got our olive tree, too.

Over the summer, everything went absolutely bananas. The chamomile flowered and went everywhere. The bergamot came out such a gorgeous, vivid deep pink that I felt my whim was vindicated a hundred times over.

Green plants have mostly got tall, and there are white chamomile flowers, deep pink bergamot, and mauve lavender

And it all kept going.

Small garden with exuberant greenery and pink and white flowers

It’s less exuberant now, obviously: it’s November again. And I trimmed the chamomile back, and I’m half way round cutting off the dead lavender flowers. Even so, it’s less tidy than the slate was, but it’s much more cheerful and welcoming – not least for the bees. I was rather pleased to read, several months into this process, that:

If you want to help a variety of bees, the best way is to plant flowers that bloom sequentially from early spring to late autumn – even if you only have a window box or pots on a patio.

Which I seem to have achieved almost accidentally. I’m glad the bees are enjoying it. I certainly am.

Week-end: seagoing paddle steamer

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Chalk cliffs, dwindling into three rocks, one with a lighthouse, seen from on board a steam boat with striking black, white and red funnels.

The good

A family trip around the Isle of Wight on the Waverley. I love to encounter venerable old craft still joyfully doing the job they were built to do, and Waverley is pretty much the epitome of that. It was a gorgeous day, too.

The difficult and perplexing

Several times it seemed that everything was dreadful, and it turned out I needed to have eaten something half an hour ago. You’d think I’d have learned by now, but no.

Also, two rail replacement buses in one journey seems excessive.

What’s working

Staying at whichever Premier Inn is most convenient for the trip. The staff always seem to love babies regardless of how much toast ends up on the floor, and if you tick the box requesting a cot, then lo and behold, a cot appears.

Reading

Consider Phlebas (Iain M. Banks). It is very White Bloke Science Fiction, but I am enjoying it very much. It feels extremely visual; cinematic, you might say. It’s big both in page count and in imagination.

When that all got a bit too exciting for four in the morning I returned to the Chalet School. I have got to The Chalet School Does It Again and slowed right down. Prunella annoys me, and also I find it a little disheartening because we have got to Switzerland, which feels like the beginning of the end, and yet there is still half the series to go. And even though it’s quite a while before the books start getting really bad (or really bonkers) Joey’s already become irritating.

I started The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (Deborah Moggach, original title These Foolish Things) on the train south, but haven’t got very far with it. (I haven’t seen the film.)

Making

Finished: one pair of baby socks. Started: one baby hat (for all the good it will do). This will also be on four double-pointed needles, but at the moment I’m knitting earflaps on two.

Watching

I caught up on all of this season of Only Connect and finished Rob and Rylan’s Grand Tour, several months after I began it.

Looking at

Apart from all the edges of the Isle of Wight, an art exhibition examining the Russian propaganda machine in the Crypt at St Pancras new church. ‘Did you like it?’ the attendant asked me on the way out. I said that ‘like’ wasn’t exactly the word, but it was fascinating and thought-provoking.

Also the inhabitants of the extremely luxurious aviary/rabbit hutch in Victoria Park in Portsmouth. I was particularly taken with one very raffish looking bunny with lopsided ears and a furry face. It looked as if it ought to have a smoking cap and a hookah.

Noticing

Lots of wildlife from the train. Heron. Cormorant. Deer. And sunflowers.

In the garden

Trying to keep the wisteria within bounds.

Appreciating

My grandfather and the rest of the Paddle Steamer Preservation Society. All my family, actually.

Acquisitions

Another badge for the camp blanket. I don’t usually collect duplicates, but this is the third from the Waverley. When I’ve sewn it on (ha!) I intend to tell you about all three.

Line of the week

Consider Phlebas is, I think, effective in a cumulative kind of a way rather than in any one particular moment, but here’s a line from one of the most effective bits.

It was like the biggest wave in the universe, rendered in scrap metal, sculpted in grinding junk; and beyond and about it, over and through, cascades of flashing, glittering ice and snow swept down in great slow veils from the cliff of frozen water beyond.

This coming week

Nothing much. Time to draw breath.

Outsourcing

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Close-up of a vine leaf, mostly yellow-green but speckled with red towards the edges

The garden is running wild, and has been since the summer. It’s been on my conscience, too. It looks a little tidier now that the leaves are falling, but it’s also more obvious how much needs trimming back and cutting down now that it isn’t just a mass of green.

So today I had someone round to give me a quote for tidying it up and, as he put it, putting it to bed for the winter. I’d love to be able to do it myself, but it just isn’t going to happen. This is the next best option.

Monday making, mending and growing

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A pram with a rucksack slung from the handles, a cushion in the body, and a trailing plant in a blue carrier back also slung from the handle.
These days I usually find myself going out with the baby in the pram, and coming back with the baby in the sling and the shopping in the pram. This was the day I bought a passion flower, two cakes, a box of cereal, and a cushion…

Not much to report other than in the garden, but I want to establish the Monday format while I remember what it is I think I’m doing. I now have all the components for my big winter skirt. I also have ideas for a couple of quilts. What I don’t have, or not for long enough to get anything done, is free hands. I’m hopeful that a baby bouncer may help there…

In the back garden, chaos continues to reign. I am meaning to get out and pick the blackberries before the devil spits (or worse) on them at Michaelmas, but I have a nasty feeling that’s as far as it’s going to go. In the front garden, I co-opted my youngest brother to plant a passion flower to replace the two that died in the heat. Tony has cleared several bags’ worth of slate chippings and all of the membrane, and the next step is for me to order some more plants to fill in the gap. I have managed to put half a dozen bulbs in with my own hands while someone else holds the baby, or she takes a (very short) nap. It’s slow going, but then gardening often is.

Week-end: little to tell (which doesn’t really help)

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Elaborate appliqué panel depicting the Garden of Eden

The good

Out and about. It is very good to not have Covid any more. It is also fun to have the use of a car.

The mixed

People are thinking of me! Which is lovely. But they all want to know how I am doing. Which is difficult, because there is very little to tell, and I tend to find that a problem shared is a problem doubled because I then feel that I have to deal with their feeling bad for me on top of the feeling bad myself. For this reason I am mostly hiding, at least from people I know.

The difficult and perplexing

Heat + waiting + hearing about other people’s relevant and irrelevant experiences and opinions = getting stressed and scared

Also, heat = dehydration = a horrible headache that had me worrying all night about pre-eclampsia. And eventually being very sick.

Also, something has been eating my legs and I don’t know whether it’s mosquitoes getting in at night or whether there are still fleas in the sofa.

What’s working

Airplane mode. Except I do need to know when the midwife wants to see me, so that’s not an option today…

And having a good cry or three. And yawning.

Reading

Continuing with Clorinda’s circle, because they are good friends and, while many distressing things happen, they mostly do so off-screen and also I already know about them all.

This morning I started Beryl: in search of Britain’s greatest athlete (Jeremy Wilson): very good so far.

Writing

I did a bit of work on Don’t Quit The Day Job but have mostly Not Been In The Mood (must try taking laptop into the garden; half the trouble is that my study is too hot).

Making

I finished the two-flannels-and-a-popper thing and can now use the very very ends of bars of soap.

Watching

Some Wimbledon. Some Tour de France. Some Giro Donne. But my concentration is not great at the moment and I am finding it difficult to get engaged, so not very much of any of them these last few days.

Looking at

Threads Through Creation (twelve panels of silk appliqué representing the Genesis creation stories) at Ely Cathedral. Medieval art and Mediterranean embroidery at the Fitzwilliam in Cambridge. Local history at Ely Museum.

Also, Ben’s Yard, which is a new shopping village between Ely and Soham. Rather underwhelming so far, although the climbing frame (in the shape of Ely Cathedral) is magnificent.

Cooking

Baked gnocchi from the Roasting Tin book (I have concluded that our oven runs ten degrees cooler than advertisted).

Eating

A Fitzbillies Chelsea bun. A dismal chickpea curry at the pub (I suspect the efficacy of curry is a myth, but it’s a good excuse, if the curry is good – which this wasn’t).

Playing

I got PomoFarm on the grounds that it’s four quid and worth a shot. I haven’t yet decided whether it’s working for me. (I’m not sure whether the pomodoro method itself works for me.)

Noticing

A tiny door (there are a few around Cambridge) made to look like that of No. 10 Downing Street, with purple tentacles emerging from around the edge. (Well, it would explain a lot…)

In the garden

I have started work on the front garden. Two passion flowers to grow up the railings, one rosemary plant, and six lavender plants (Lidl were doing boxes of three for four quid). That row will be finished by bringing one of the bay trees round to the front, but it’s going to take more, stronger people (I can barely manage a watering can at the moment), possibly with a trolley of some sort. The good thing about the horrible slate chippings is that they’re on top of plastic sheeting which can be pulled up a bit at a time.

In the back garden, the runner beans are just beginning to flower; so are the tomatoes; and one of the chilli plants has produced a flower. I have forgotten which chilli was which, which may have been a mistake.

Appreciating

The cat’s been very sociable these last couple of days. It’s been nice.

Acquisitions

Plants, as detailed above. Also a new lampshade for the sitting room, in what turned out to be a perfect match for the barszcz coloured wall. This means that we can replace the hideous ribbon-and-plastic-crystal one in my study/the nursery with the boring but inoffensive lilac one we previous haddown there.

In the Emmaus charity shop: a large reel of black yarn which I intend to use for darning; a cafetière (sometimes one needs to provide more than one person at a time with decent coffee); and a paperback copy of Madam, Will You Talk?

And, in hankerings fulfilled (well, almost), a garden table (currentlyh in bits) and a filleting knife. I must go and buy another fish somewhere.

Hankering

Really I just want this baby to show up.

Line of the week

I remember loving this line (from ‘Had we never loved sae kindly, we had ne’er been broken-hearted’ in A Man of Independent Mind) the first time round, too.

O my dear, says Clorinda with a tearful laugh, sure ’tis no matter upon which one may make mathematical calculations of degrees of infelicity.

Sunday snippet

Mostly I’ve been moving things around, but this bit’s new:

And sure, the Tour de France is never going to be an option for me, for any number of reasons. But I could quite easily get to a standard where the London to Brighton ride was a realistic proposition. I’d just need to put the miles in. It’s exactly the same principle with writing, and with a much smaller chance of road rash.

This coming week

I intend to hide, mostly. How many how are you? questions can I avoid?

Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here!

Week-end: alarums and excursions

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Four houses, all with many small birds perched along the ridges of the roofs

The good

My friend Maggie was ordained priest yesterday. I’d said a while ago not to bother saving me a ticket, because I might well be otherwise engaged, but in the event I wasn’t, so I watched the service on Youtube and then walked up to the cathedral to give her a hug afterwards. (I timed it pretty much perfectly: left the house during the distribution of communion; got there just as the bishop and new priests were coming out to have their photos taken.)

It was really lovely to get out and see people (there were others I knew milling around, because the Church of England is a very small world). It was lovely to get out at all, really.

The mixed

Slow progress is still progress. Midnight alarums and excursions (don’t worry, everything’s fine).

The difficult and perplexing

Really, aside from a mild case of cabin fever, I have nothing to worry about. I’m not dealing terribly well with waiting, but then I never do.

What’s working

Picking one thing to do, doing that, and then having a lie-down.

Reading

I finished the main run of The Comfortable Courtesan stories, got a bit weepy at the end, and decided that I wasn’t quite feeling up to tackling the extended universe.

I also read Along the Way: the journey of a father and son (Martin Sheen, Emilio Estevez, and Hope Edelman). My favourable impression of this began with the fact that the ghostwriter is credited in large letters on the cover, and continued more or less all the way through. It’s mostly a memoir of family life, but it goes into a lot of detail on the making of The Way. (Which is what drew me to pick it up in the library discard sale.) I was very surprised to discover that they were shooting The Way in September 2009, which was only a couple of years after I walked the Camino Frances. But then it takes a long time for a film to happen, and I didn’t see it on its first release.

I’ve written before, briefly, about where The Way fails to convey the sheer grinding physicality of the Camino. And it is the physicality that sticks with me: the texture of boots that have been left too close to the fire overnight; walking through period pain so intense that I was sick (never before or since…) I think it’s basically impossible to get across such a three-dimensional (four-dimensional, maybe: time is an important component) experience in a two-dimensional medium. What the film does capture is the power of encounter and relationship; what it skips over is the fleeting nature of most of those encounters.

But Along the Way wasn’t just a book about the film; it was about parenthood, and masculinity (toxic and otherwise), and acting, and the film industry, and faith, and what all of that looks like in practice. And it seemed honest, and it was a very engaging read.

I am not sure that I would walk the Camino again – certainly not in summer, probably not the Camino Frances – and a lot of that is feeling that I’ve had my turn and I need to make space for other people. And, of course, the less generous flipside, which is that there are now too many people on the Camino, and it would no longer be what it was. (Of course it wouldn’t: I’m not twenty-one any more. Or thirty-one. And I seem to do it at major transitions in my life, and the current major transition is one that makes long-distance walking a lot less practical than it was. And the pilgrimage-shaped hole in my life is currently filled with Cursillo. Although I shouldn’t be entirely surprised if I end up doing it again at forty-one, never mind everything that I’ve just said.) And I’m sure The Way had something, though not everything, to do with the increase in traffic. Even so, I came away from this book feeling in greater charity towards the film and towards the Sheen/Estevez clan in general. They seem like a good bunch.

Making

I’ve been sewing two flannels together (very slowly) and will shortly add a popper as a fastening, so that I end up with a pouch that I can fill with ends of soap that have got too small and annoying to be in the soap dish.

Watching

Still almost entirely sports. Eastbourne, last week, and now the Tour and the Giro Donne. (A friend has suggested that we name the impending sprog after whoever wins the day’s stage. I am not sure that we will go with this.)

Looking at

Pictures of London Pride on Instagram. I’m wryly amused that I ignored or turned down four separate offers of wristbands (the bisexuals, the Bond fans, the Christians, and work – not sure this really counts as intersectionality) on the grounds that I might be busy, and then was only very slightly busy. But actually I’ve never particularly wanted to go to London Pride, and the idea of going to London at all is mightily unappealing at present.

Cooking

Roast carrots and parsnips with quinoa, from the Roasting Pan Cookbook. Either the timings in the book are off, or the fan function of our oven is not trustworthy, but an extra ten minutes on the standard oven function and with the foil removed did the trick, and the result was very nice.

Also a new potato, broad bean and feta salad. (Mint, thyme and bayleaves in the cooking water; chopped chervil, parsley and capers in the dressing. Really very good.)

And I think I’ve finally got the knack of yoghurt in the Instant Pot (use full fat milk, boil for an extra five minutes beyond what the pot thinks, incubate for five hours).

The peach shrub is done in theory but in practice needs to mellow more. Still, it has got me to learn how to use the Soda Stream at long last (it’s not at all difficult; I am just not that interested in fizz).

Eating

As above.

Noticing

Hollyhocks! They seem to be a thing around here; they grow very tall and they are bright and cheerful. Maybe I should grow some.

And, as per picture at the top of this post, rooftops and rooftops of starlings. They are usually around, but not usually in such numbers. We’d had eight or so demolishing a suet cake on the bird feeder earlier in the day, but I wasn’t expecting to see this. This isn’t even all the relevant roofs. I don’t know if you can call it a murmuration if it’s mostly static, but either way, it was quite a sight.

In the garden

Fruit is swelling. (I’m going to have to pull up some of the jungle under the plum trees in order to be able to harvest without being scratched or stung.) Lots of things could do with a trim. There are just a couple of love-in-a-mist flowers that have self-seeded from plants I grew… maybe our first year here?

I have drawn up a plan for the front but am not going to act on it until bending over becomes more comfortable.

Appreciating

People! (Particularly Tony.)

Hankering

I’m missing the old days of LiveJournal, the way it used to be in 2006 or so. Most of the social media sites seem to be becoming unusable in one way or another. I just want to see what the people I like are up to! In such a way that I can find the posts again if I want to look back at them! And without having to look at the same one over and over and over again!

The cat’s current preferred location

On top of the paper trimmer in the conservatory. I am glad she has moved on from the fridge; I can’t feel that having little clumps of black fluff float down into the kitchen was entirely sanitary.

Line of the week

Havi on screens and screening:

Nature abhors a vacuum, and goes wild for a door.

This coming week

Your guess is as good as mine, honestly.

Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here!

Week-end: hurry up and wait

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A fluffy black and white cat looks down at the camera from the top of a fridge

The good

I tested negative for Covid on Wednesday, after not having bothered (it wasn’t as if I was going anywhere) since last Friday. This is a great relief. It seems to have knocked me out less than the last bout did, though I’m still falling asleep all the time (mind you, I’ve been doing that for the last nine months…)

The difficult and perplexing

(I said I’d be whingeing about this for months to come:) it’s too hot.

What’s working

The sofa bed. Ice lollies.

Reading

Other than finishing off The Chronicles of Count Antonio, I’ve been rereading The Comfortable Courtesan series. I’ve got up to Domestick Disruptions. I’d forgotten how fast everything happens in the beginning: the epistolick mathematickal flirtation, the appearance of Mr F-, the elopement… I think that probably reflects the way that it started out being written a few sentences at a time; but anyway, the contrast with the current story (which I am also keeping up with) is quite interesting.

Mending

I was feeling vaguely energetic yesterday, so I did a couple of darns on a couple of Tony’s T-shirts.

Watching

Queen’s, mostly, though I have also been falling asleep in front if it.

Cooking

I was looking forward to veg box peaches, but the texture was really not pleasant. So I’m experimenting making peach shrub.

Eating

A tiramisu gelato. Very nice it was too. And wild strawberries, straight off the plants.

Noticing

A great spotted woodpecker! It came up from the other side of the fence, so I saw the head first, then the spotted bit, and finally the red flash and tail. That’s two woodpeckers I’ve seen in the garden now (there was a green one a couple of years ago).

I’ve been spending quite a lot of time sitting under the pergola, and have seen various birds from there. Sparrows. A robin. There’s also a very bold thrush which doesn’t seem to be at all bothered by my wandering right past.

In the garden

Besides birds – the nasturtiums are on the point of flowering; the pink roses are going great guns, as are the Peruvian lilies. I bought some French sorrel from a plant stand outside someone’s house and put that in.

We’re thinking of what we can do with the front garden, which at present is a dismal rectangle of slate chippings. It’s more or less eastward facing and gets a lot of sun; what it won’t reliably get is water, because the water butts and outside tap are all round the back, and I’ve been having enough trouble getting around the back garden with a watering can the last couple of years. I understand that this part of the country is technically a desert; it certainly feels like one today. Also we don’t want anything that grows higher than about four feet, or it’ll block the light to the front window. Thus far my mind is defaulting to tulips, but we also need something for the months of the year that aren’t April. I don’t think I’ve ever had a blank slate (pun not intended) garden before; it’s a little daunting.

Appreciating

Sleep.

Acquisitions

French sorrel. A baby changing mat and some anti-scratch mitts. A bird feeder with an anti-squirrel cage.

Hankering

Looked at some filleting knives but didn’t buy any. And we can’t get the garden table we had our eye on without also getting the chairs, which we don’t want. (The little one we got last month is excellent for the two of us, but won’t be much help when it comes to company, or when company comes to us.)

The cat’s current preferred location

On top of the fridge.

Line of the week

From The Menologium, quoted and translated by Eleanor Parker in Winters in the World:

… It likes then/ to gaze longer upon the earth and to move more slowly/ across the fields of the world, the fairest of lights/ and of all created things.

This coming week

More waiting, I expect.

Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Ideas for what to do with a small eastward-facing plot? Share them here!

Week-end: imitate the actions of

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Fluffy black and white cat flopping on a piece of cardboard (which shows some evidence of her having attacked it with her claws); both forelegs and one hindleg stuck straight out in front of her

I am done. I realised this on Monday when I arrived in the office. I am ready to just sit in the garden now. Or possibly upstairs, with the air conditioner on. I’m imitating the actions of the flopcat. Probably the world number one expert in flop.

The good

Useful appointment with the midwife. The infant is aligned optimally. We shall see what happens next, and when.

Jolly gin-tasting (tonic-drinking, for me) evening with colleagues.

And a blessedly joyful, joyfully blessed Ultreya yesterday to welcome the new members from our most recent Cursillo. People had to keep putting out more chairs! Afterwards we sat in the churchyard and ate our sandwiches and chatted, with swifts (maybe housemartins?) swooping overheard.

The mixed

Excitement and apprehension, wanting to sit down and rest but also to catch up with everyone while I can…

The difficult and perplexing

I’ll probably be saying this every week until September, but I’m so hot. It did rain a little bit this morning, but the forecast thunderstorms didn’t materialise.

What’s working

The air conditioner, which we have had since about February, but which as of yesterday afternoon is installed and functioning.

And the cargo bike, in which one can transport quite remarkable quantities of stuff. I am looking forward to being able to ride the thing myself.

And filling a washing up bowl with cold water and sticking my feet in it.

Reading

Keeping on with The Third Policeman, which continues to be utterly bizarre and really quite charming. Nearly there with The Chronicles of Count Antonio, who is no match for a bargain basement Milady de Winter (spoiler: he gets away with this due to her turning very feeble).

A couple of lovely blog posts: this, on food and fellowship, and this, on compassion and clarity and miracles.

Out loud: the second lesson this morning, which was the apostle Paul at his most snide.

Writing

Keeping on with Don’t Quit The Day Job, which, ironically enough, has proved impossible to finish while doing the day job. We’ll see if maternity leave can sort it out. (There is quite a large section on when you can’t bloody well write – oh, I read a good blog post on that this week, too.)

Watching

I returned to Detectorists, but mostly I’ve been watching the Critérium du Dauphiné. Mountains, and people working harder than me.

Cooking

An Instant Pot risotto variation with broad beans and spring greens. Not bad, though it needed something to give it a bit more zing. Maybe lemon juice? Also, I have decided that life is too short to double-pod broad beans.

Today, lamb in dill sauce from Slow Cooking Just For Yourself. The sauce refused to thicken despite the use of both cornflour and egg yolk, but it was very tasty nonetheless.

Eating

What I should have done was pretend to be vegetarian when I signed up for the (not) gin tasting, as the keynote edible offering was a charcuterie selection which mostly looked off-limits to me. But I did quite nicely on crisps and nibbles and leftover vegetarian bits.

Today, for lunch: a Krakower bacon and cheese sausage from the German sausage cart at the market, followed by a pomegranate gelato on the way home. Not bad at all.

This evening I took my lamb in dill sauce out into the garden and ate it off our new blue metal table. I did feel a bit like Shirley Valentine drinking her wine alone at the edge of the sea, but it was very pleasant.

Moving

People seem to be impressed that I’m still cycling. Look, once I’ve got up the hill (and I gave up trying to ride up Back Hill several months ago) the rest is easy.

Noticing

Swifts, I said, and there was a dragonfly briefly hovering outside the church yesterday morning. A spotted brown butterfly and a few little blue ones. And a large woodpigeon landing on a very slender birch bough, which swayed most entertainingly.

Just now, a spider – fortunately before it crawled inside my dress.

In the garden

We spent last Sunday afternoon getting rid of the annoying willow tree. (I like willows, in their place – which is not our tiny back garden. I don’t know what the previous owners, or the ones before them, were thinking.) This gives more space to a sad morello cherry tree, some raspberry canes, and a couple of self-seeded hollies. My current thinking is that I’ll let the big one of those stay and take the other one out, but we’ll see.

I’m having to be rather more cautious with watering than I’ve been in previous years, because even with the watering can only half-full I can feel my back complaining, but most things seem to be surviving so far. There is one rose on each of the three bushes. My favourite is still the white one, but I do appreciate the way the pink one is so unashamedly out there, being a rose. And the peony, far from being dead, has flowered! Only one flower, and I think it will stay that way, but it’s a proper bright pink cheerful blowsy peony and I am very pleased with it.

Appreciating

The outpouring of love and encouragement and support from the Cursillo community. Tony, who is willing to cart all sorts of paraphernalia around for me and set up air conditioners while I’m snoozing on the sofa. I have excellent people in my life.

Acquisitions

A bottle of gin. For future reference, you might say.

Line of the week

From Havi’s piece on Loving Clarity:

I love Loving-Kindness for its poetic feel, and I love it as the translation to an impossible-to-translate feeling, something warmer than Mercy, sweeter than Grace, kinder than kindness, an enhanced kindness.

Sunday snippet

All my books are really written for myself, but this bit in particular is me writing what I need to read:

And I think that what it comes back to is this: writing is not easy. It won’t just happen, particularly not in a time-environment that’s crowded with other projects and priorities. Therefore, you have to choose to make it happen, over and over, word by word. Sometimes the choice is easy; sometimes it disappears entirely. You won’t always choose writing – and that may be because you want to meet up with a friend you haven’t seen in years, or it may be because you’re too tired for anything but a pizza and whatever happens to be on telly. You don’t have to choose writing all the time. You only have to choose it often enough.

This coming week

… is my last week at work! It contains one session in which I attempt to train some colleagues on the use of the learning management system, one regular training session, further efforts at clearing my desk, and some frivolities. At least, that’s the theory. We’re already well on the way into the great unknown.

Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here!