Today

Not a bad weekend on the whole. Not seething with gay socialising but productive, despite quantities of bucketing rain. This morning, I seized the carpe diem (to use a redundant translation) and did the front garden, rather than idly thinking "I'll do it after lunch" and then finding that it poured down. I really quite like it whenI get down to doing it. I don't even mind weeding. I dug over the bed and pulled out some splendid weeds. I mowed our little patch of grass. Took me all of 2 hours and it looks very nice indeed.

I've learnt that, as a full-time working person with many outside commitments, it's foolishness to commit to doing more gardening than you can do in a very short time. I've many times bought trays of bedding plants, only to see them gradually wither away as I didn't have the time to plant them. So I've now the space to put in some plants and am much more likely actually to plant some if I make the purchase part of another weekend's duties.

In My Day

Gardening at 4 Beulah Hill was much more of a military campaign that anything else. The back garden stretched for about 300 or 400 feet, was surrounded with mature trees and had a shrubby bank to one side. At the front was a gravel sweep with more beds and trees.

Mowing the lawn took the best part of half a day and was done from time to time. Mamma used to attack the flower beds on occasion, yanking out massive weeds and trying to keep at least the most visible tidy. This meant managing the two walled rose borders in front of the house, Looking after "Coronation Corner" and gazing at the rest of the garden in despair.

As Mamma was an experienced nursery gardener, this was simply another case of overload.

The mature trees, were a problem as well as they had a habit of falling over. On one occasion this happened after a heavy fall of snow and a large laburnum felt right across the road, blocking cars, buses and lorries for miles. We just all had to pitch in, carrying away loads of logs as Daddy sawed up the tree.

When Mamma and Daddy retired to Dorking Mamma's garden was a thing of beauty. She loved all sorts of plants and taught me a great deal.

The back garden still needs sorting out, though.