A letter to the garden - December 2019

Dear garden,

The year is coming to a close and I have kept my promise to write to you more frequently.  It feels like writing to you is the best I can manage at the moment as the weather is striving to keep us apart.  It has rained so much that the ground has been sodden for weeks now and I am feeling increasingly frustrated at the lack of meaningful gardening that is happening.
Ok, ok, back a step.  You are right of course, there has been some gardening.  I have planted bulbs, this felt like a major achievement.  I have also replanted the bulbs the squirrels have dug up a couple of times.

I have also carried out some light pruning of a couple of trees.  Nothing significant though as the garden is so boggy underfoot I do not like to walk on it too much.  I find pruning this time of year a good way of at least doing something outside.  If it is not actually raining I prefer to be outdoors than in.

The weeds however are continuing to grow.  We have had an occasional frost and it is quite chilly, but the temperatures are generally not dipping below freezing.  The weeds are taking advantage and growing as much as they can.  Now you and I know, dear garden, that every weed removed now is worth a couple of hundred next year.  I am now looking at this in horror thinking that they already have a hold for next spring.
Calm, calm, it will be fine.  I know it will be fine, or at worst it will be.  I have just looked out of the window whilst I am writing this and it is not raining.  So dear garden, I am off out into the garden to remove a weed or three and to revel in the joy that is a self-sown cyclamen. Wish me luck.

Love and kisses

Your gardener.

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