It was chilly this morning, but by late afternoon we were back in high summer. London early June. Hot with blazing sun. Sunburn weather, really. The big guy got back from work and we agreed to take a walk to the allotment. I wanted to call and provide an opportunity to switch the keys – and also request a spare key for Mr G. Despite dripping and soaked through after his four mile sprint home, he was amenable to the notion. ‘But only if we go down and water the grass seed first.‘
That would be the grass seed spread on the front woods lawn to the back and side of the ‘Michael Palin’ oak and new flower bed on Sunday last. So we did. He watered in repeated trips with a watering can, and I weeded and did some spot watering on the half circle bed in the woods, as well as somehow finding time to trim the tops of the side elevation bed’s currant bushes, thoroughly watering the raised bed with edible cherry, black currant and strawberries. (Amazing how currant trimmings actually smell like black currants! Try it! You’ll be amazed.) The espalier cherry are setting fruit, as are the currants and also the strawberries. There, hidden, nestled at ground level you could just about see the pale white unripe strawberries – still forming but most hopefully making their presence known. Yum!
And on we went until the mister thought he’d done enough watering and we were good to go. At which point I retrieved a portion of ‘found’ wooden lattice trellis to use as framing for our new plot – to divide the edge from the one in front of us, which presents a 3 foot drop from our level, and some of it into a sunken cast iron bathtub full of green slippery slimy growth and toads’ tadpoles. Gadzooks it’s dangerous. A restraining edge, trellis border, is most definitely required. And off we set.
So there we were, walking back from an evening meal out at a local cafe. Ambling along hand in hand, and then got to dawdling along the railway path – the last stretch back to the flat – and stopped to wonder at all the plants. The rose on the wooden pergola is going absolutely bonkers and is at this moment dripping in flower buds. When it all opens up – and the roses will very soon come into blossom – it will be glorious.
Philosophising... 