Facing ivy in league

I spent yesterday working alongside my husband - I like to be there, I enjoy it when people call us in to tackle their gardens.  He puts nice stripes on their lawns (weather permitting) and I tackle the bushes.  Yesterday it was the turn of ivies, morning and afternoon.

Ivy grows up and over from the neighbours' house and pulls down trellises with its suckers.  Ivy spreads like a horizontal tree, ends up vertical and then fruits.  Ivy creeps under boundaries and along the ground.

I tackle ivy methodically.  First I cut off everything in front of my face.  Then it's on to the hard bit. Those long dangling portions are disposed of and now I see the structure, the trunk, which can be as thick as my wrist.  Out with the heavy duty pruners and take it down section by section, tearing off ivy from the fence as I go.  The brown bin is full and I've only tackled two panels.  The customer and her neighbour will have to consult.  I've exposed the situation and made a start.

I pack up and go.  The spiders and snails I dislodged are finding a new home.  I'm off to mine.

Bank Holiday Weekend - Canes in the Rain

On Saturday, in the light rain, I began the job.  There was thunder and lightning as I finished, sheltering in the small greenhouse and feeling the glass shake and vibrate with the thunder overhead.  But I had managed to cut out most of the dry canes from this summer's raspberries that grow in the shade of our eating apples, kneeling on the damp grass of the path to reach into the thicket. 

Raspberries give me hope for harvest.  Next summer's canes are already growing green and tall.  In similar fashion, it was time to tackle the tayberries, disentangling their long dead runners from the new shoots and cutting them out.  Propping next year's floppy growth over the ramshackle supports to tie in later. 

And the big job that I had tried to avoid.  The wild blackberry, cousin to the tayberry, that sent its branches up into the apple tree.  The right place for blackberries is along the hedge on the other plot where we can keep them under control.  A methodical cutting out of sections, branch by branch down to the root until it was all down and in the brown recycling bin.  Now I can see my tree. 

Mornings

Yesterday was quiet.  I got to the allotment earlier than usual, before my neighbour opened up his shed, started strimming or turned on the radio.  Before the children in the house behind the plot came out and started bouncing on their trampoline.  Before the man with the grinder in the alley opposite started on his DIY.  It felt very peaceful.  I did not feel I was on the allotment at all.  I was on holiday. 

Long ago when I used to go walking I would feel like this at the beginning of a day in the Austrian Alps.  The air was fresh, we had breakfasted, put on our boots and were ready to climb the waymarked paths.  Around us were alpine flowers.  The breeze carried the sound of distant cowbells.  It was a sublime experience.

I don't have to get into one of the circling planes I see flying overhead and go abroad.  I have it all here - flowers, clouds, dewy grass and the morning ahead of me.

Allotment Meditations - Prelude: getting there

I have just returned from a Quiet Day at the Chelmsford Diocesan House of Retreat at Pleshey (www.retreathousepleshey.com) and have been inspired by their circular walk and prayers.  Why not write your own, my friend suggested.  I thought, yes, I could have a go, based on the allotment.  Not everyone can visit the allotment, but you can visit this blog.  Here goes......  Oh, and before I start, the new illustration, taken by my husband,is his Hartley greenhouse, his pride and joy.

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Sooner or later I will get to the allotment.  Some days it is easy.  I wake up, have breakfast, pack my cloth trug, water and suncream, put on a hat and I'm off. 

Sometimes, I want to sleep.  Blood sugars are high. Consequently I grumpily procrastinate. 

Sometimes I pull on my green wellingtons and walk in the rain. 

Whenever I get to the gate things are different.  I unlock and slide back the bolt and walk through to another world.