Almost daily diary!

Tuesday, May 30, 2017

A walk around Mums Garden

I turn up with a bunch of Sweet Williams which we both sniff as I walk in and make the same disappointed face to. "Maybe they'll start to smell later" I state, though why they should do that I have no idea, but it seemed to make both of us happier!

I am at Mums. I am able to walk here, now we live so close, but it seems I see less of her now than when I had to drive an hour to get here. Odd really, but maybe it has to do with avoiding the stepfather, which is possible now that I don't have to stay for a whole day.

It is lovely here in the sun. I get two deck chairs out of the garage, directed by Mum, who always despairs about 'the state of the garage'. Anyway, I arrange them in semi-shade on the grass before realising I'd arranged them around the fish...yes, that's right, not the 'fish pond' but just the fish - last nights leftovers left out for the birds! Blatantly crows don't eat fish skin, and who could blame them? The shiny skins glistened in the increasing heat of the day. I thought about removing them but then Mum decided that we could just move the chairs a bit further away, so we did but the skins kept distracting me in a disturbing way, like some sort of macabre art installation.

We had a little 'tour' of the garden. It did look lovely, with lots in bloom and potential for lots more. I miss my garden at these moments especially as so much of Mums garden was also in mine so would also have been in bloom now.

We looked at the new roses, which were perfectly manicured and the Iris - not so good this year - before hop skipping over the fish again to look at the Hostas.
"The slugs are eating them" squeals Mum.
"You can't kill the slugs!" I say, "they could have been someones mother" - perhaps I have spent too long at the Buddhist Centre recently.
"But they're eating all my lovely plants!" she says as though in pain.
"They can't help it" I say "that's just nature."
"I wish they'd just eat the weeds instead" she says exasperated.
"I don't think the slugs can tell the difference between a 'weed' and a 'proper' plant Mum"!

She starts a mass massacre of greenfly on some buds elsewhere in the garden and I look on mournfully having resisted rescuing my pansies recently from an infestation of white fly (reincarnated mothers!) but instead watched the white fly massacre my plants.

6 comments:

nick said...

I summoned all the slugs to a meeting recently and explained very carefully the difference between nasty old weeds and bona fide plants. They seemed to be taking it all in, but the day after they were back to their usual tricks and happily munching everything in sight.

I'd like to see a bit more of my mum but she lives 350 miles away in Cambridgeshire so that's a bit tricky. And she's taken to not answering the phone (she only has a landline) so now I seldom speak to her either. These 95 year olds are a headache!

Maggie May said...

I have one granddaughter who batters slugs to death and another who throws them into salt water!
Where have we gone wrong?!
I'm trying to get some inspiration to write a post!
Everything seems OK thanks.
Haven't you got a garden now?
Maggie x

Suburbia said...

Hi Maggie
Glad you're ok and good luck with inspiration!
I have a garden but we are renting for 2 years, there's 2 pear trees which are lovely but the rest is grass and gravel. I'm reluctant to plant as I don't want to lose another garden! However I have some nice pots x

Suburbia said...

Damn slugs Nick! That made me laugh!
95 is a good age, difficult if she doeskin answer the phone :-(

Liz Hinds said...

Slugs? Over into next door's garden!

Crows don't eat fish skins? She needs a George.

I hope your pear trees are more successful than ours.

Rob-bear said...

Since we've gone from having a house to having a condo, there are about zero options for a garden. But I enjoy seeing other peoples results.

Blessings and Bear hugs, Mom!