I did venture into landscape gardening once.
It involved me wasting
a stupid amount of money at Wentworth Garden Centre buying alpines, eucalyptus
trees, hostas and Mediterranean herbs that were completely unsuitable for my
garden and which subsequently proved it to me by getting obliterated to death by
pests and shit growing conditions.
So I threw the towel in.
I wouldn’t even entertain a house
plant or a hanging basket because I knew despite all my good intentions, I’d
probably kill em.
And then one late midsummer’s evening, I visited my friend’s
allotment and my interest in growing fruit, flowers and veg piqued again. Only this time though, I wanted to do it
properly.
He’d invited me into his community allotment programme and in
exchange for a few hours digging up spuds, I had found myself being rewarded with
a deep plastic tray filled to the brim with different coloured chards, purple
sprouted broccoli, several types of mints, thymes & oreganos, parsnips,
shallots and enough potatoes to see us through until Christmas.
He then took me to the communal polytunnel and gave me
another tray laden with tiger tomatoes, bell peppers and a shitload of chillies.
And that was it.
I was completely hooked.
