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Winter leaves us dramatically

© Gay Klok

I am sitting at my old computer, looking out the window at the rain pouring out of leaden skies. I feel frustrated, this is almost the first weekend, since our long holiday, that I am itching to get into the garden and really down to it. My subsequent bronchitis and the mad rush to get my photograph pages uploaded to a new server found me sharing my time between coughing all over the computer and lying exhausted on top of my bed. I have not finished writing about the gardens we visited on our journey, the Dutch gardens and Scottish gardens are to come. The tripping around the World all seems rather a long time ago and now we have visitors coming to our garden in early October, the Rhododendron Society will visit us and then in early November, the Garden History Society.

Spring is rushing in with the impetus of the fool hardy, it is still officially Winter in the Southern Hemisphere. Try telling that to the Camellias and the early Rhododendrons. They think they are brave enough to ignore the occasional early morning frosts and are full of flowers and fat, soon to open buds. I guess the plants have the right idea. The weather has gone crazy all over this earth, no one can foretell what tomorrow will bring. I can imagine the Camellias saying to the Rhododendrons "If man likes to heat up the atmosphere, make the soil salty, raise the level of the oceans, add to the greenhouse effect and enlarge the hole in the ozone, let it be on his or hers own conscience. We are going to forget it and just do our thing, when we like. And we bet you we can make more flowers with a stronger, clearer red than you can!" "I doubt that" reply the more arrogant red Rhododendrons

Eavesdropping on this remarkable conversation, I murmur to myself, "Well, I am not going to completely ignore the foolishness of our politicians. I will never use spray, I will not artificially water the town garden and I will try to do better with sorting my rubbish in the city. I already throw everything on to the compost heap at the country property. There I have room to make a mountain of rich, organic soil and I will only use natural fertilizers"

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