I am not a gardener

I am not a gardener – huge understatement. When we moved to our house in Milton Keynes three years ago, one of the delights not spotted when we first looked round the property, was our very own vine at the bottom of the garden. I was seriously chuffed, and very soon started work on a sermon on Jn. 15 in which now I could speak with the sort of insight that comes only from personal experience. For a very, very short time, I even thought about making this my project in the garden. However, all my romanticising came to nought when I observed very speedily what a huge job this was to be - the vine, grapes included, was more like a triffid!

After the first summer I ‘pruned’ it and the family wondered seriously whether I’d killed it. No such luck! It came back with a vengeance, and realising that this wasn’t something that you just occasionally trimmed, but needed to nurture, and regularly, I cut it back to a stump and gave it some special treatment that would ensure that it wouldn’t grow. But it did! So I gave it a double dose, and that did the trick. I’m sorry if this offends your sensibilities, but as I say, I am not a gardener, and this was too big a job.

I am not a gardener, but some things have to be done, and I can’t hide behind the excuse that I’m too busy, because so is Cazz. So, on a ‘do as necessary’ basis I wield a hedge trimmer in a Rambo-esque manner, and have found that it serves for more than just hedges. And the latest acquisition, for the endless dandelions that grow in the lawn and the soil, is a ‘Wilkinson Sword Weeder’, described by one advertisement as the ‘Wilkinson Sword Miracle Weeder’. I tried it out briefly last week but I’ve just had a proper go, and although ‘miracle weeder’ is a tad exaggerated, it’s pretty good and I’ve just had a productive half-hour, dealing with the weeds.

Andrew, our youngest son, mows the lawn at a price, so I’m now going to take a well earned rest and contemplate whether that’s the gardening done for the rest of the summer.

Comments

Glen Marshall said…
"One is closer to God's heart in a Garden than anywhere else in the world." I do hope not.
Unknown said…
gardening is therapy - I see it's working! maybe Glen needs it too.
Tyburn said…
hmmm. Well perhaps this is too...C of E...but the reason you couldnt kill the vine easily is because Vines can be grafted, hacking them to death is nigh on impossible. Taking cuttings and planting them into plastic pots and handing them out to members of the congregation after preaching about "I am the Vine you are the Branches" however would be stupendous

Following that you invite the church community back to your Garden and demonstrate the other part about Vines, that is, what GOD plans to do with the parts of the vine only good enough for the fire.

Et voile, a surmon, no more vine, did I miss my calling?? I kid, I kid

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