Illustration by Clara Dupré
I’m not saying I have a problem. It’s definitely normal for a person whose life is relatively simple, few meetings, no small children, to do a bit of plant-care before leaving the house. If anything, it’s a sign of efficiency. I am a good farmer, a true custodian of nature’s bounty.
Take this morning. Let others waste stale kettle water or coffee grounds. I fed the grounds lovingly to my chives, tipped the old water on to my thirsty tradescantia and pilea, mopped up the spillage, then, with the now-damp dishcloth, polished the leaves of the nearby monstera while simultaneously sensibly inspecting it for new shoots, tucking in a few air-roots, attempting to turn it towards the light, realising it needs rerepotting, looking up “massive Swiss size?”, quickly putting down my phone.
It’s all about good husbandry; I’m Thoreau. I’m Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Ma and Pa. Then it was merely a matter of adding roof-terrace herbs to leftovers for lunch, changing my now caffeinated garments, shouldering my work-tools (laptop, books, seven kilos of fruit) and setting off into the wild. And if as, keys in hand, while quickly inspecting last night’s mulberry-gin batch and returning for the forgotten lunchbox, I’d ignored all my phone alarms (“leave soon”, “leave”, “really leave”, “LEAVE”), what of it? Only sadists and puritans call this the best part of the day. It was fine. If I avoided all further plant life, I could leg it to the library and still get a good few hours of writing done. Brisk trotting, earbuds in, no waylaying by the garden centre (ibid). I’m a highly respected professional: fiction needs me. Soon I’d be communing with the Muse.
Is that a runner-bean flower?
The two-mile walk to the library passes many mansion blocks: dirty great multistoreys in burgundy brick; tiny 1960s inserts like dental crowns in Victorian terraces. An ex-resident of several, a connoisseur of small-space gardening, I always peer through their railings, hoping that someone has dared to plant seeds. Whether they’re run by pioneering individuals, scoffing in the face of pollution and foxes, or groups determined to improve the lives of residents, community vegetable patches lift the soul. In Lewisham, Bristol, Birmingham, they’re powerful tools for improving mental health, reconnecting neighbours and the foods they or their ancestors once knew. They’re also fun. New Orleans, Stockholm, Sydney, Amsterdam: my travelling highlight is often the communal edible gardens I’ve wandered through or broken into, the random conversations I’ve had, in languages I can’t actually speak, with strangers who also love plants. Or, perhaps, are doing community outreach. Who cares? The police haven’t caught me yet.
I’ve wandered through or broken into many communal gardens. Who cares? The police haven’t caught me yet
And so, ever since my gardening addiction hit, I’ve peered at the split flowerpots and slumped compost sacks outside the block by the dog park, where some hero clearly once gardened and then was vanquished. I felt for them; I worried. Years have passed, neglect deepens.
But, today it was transformed.
Bean plants, far more impressive than my own, twined up a sinister plastic scaffold. Among marigolds and tonsil-pink begonias grew spinach, peas and a majestic Scotch bonnet chilli. I spotted a folding chair, a dustpan; whoever had wrought this magic was both older and neater than me, but definitely my friend. I’d barely spent 10 minutes lingering. A servant to Literature, I must press on. And, because I vary my route, to avoid boredom, certainly not because I have no sense of direction, map-reading ability or awareness of left/right, north/south or indeed up/down, how dare you, I emerged quite quickly near the library, outside a particularly dismal block whose balconies show no signs of love. But lo! Where once was concrete, now I saw neat wooden beds filled with rows of courgette-plants, possible kohlrabi, mustard-greens, carrots. In a deeper bed, tomatoes were going bonkers; side shoots removed, stems lashed to sticks with blue string. These people were pros.
And, as I gazed, I remembered that behind this mighty block I’d once found vegetable beds, now demolished for… bike sheds? Cesspits? A Londis? Was this the replacement? It was much smaller, shadier, but it lived.
Time to hurry. The clock – grandfather or possibly cuckoo – was ticking. The community skip-and-pallet garden round the back of the library itself is also being razed; at least I was safe from my usual dreamy interlude admiring the compost bins. So I could, in fact should, nip to the bookshop for one of the several thousand gardening and cookery books, or simple novels, I violently need. Reading is, after all, my job, my vocation. Couple of ticks, and I’d be at my desk.
It worked out fine. I only passed one more communal vegetable garden, beside a Supasaver. With creative spying, I observed olives, figs, cucamelons, plus many unexciting shrubs so, after a few short eons, I left. Back over six lanes of traffic; within moments, I was through the beautiful doors of the library, breathing the scholarly air. It was closing soon, but no matter. Like Thoreau, I had partaken of nature, and was refreshed.
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