This is my third growing season.
The first season was just a few pots on the balcony. Compost, seeds, tools, gloves all from Poundland. Seeds not sown until the end of April. One tiny propagator not filled with enough soil, plants spindly and unsupported. As I wallowed and wondered what on earth my life would become, trying to figure out where I fitted into the plans we had made together, uncertain of the way forward - here were these plants growing and growing and giving fruit and getting bigger, regardless of the world around them. My balcony became green and lush and full of life. I picked fresh fat radishes, beans and lettuce. I was so proud of what I had achieved. I felt capable and alive. I didn't feel so hopeless.
The second season I was ready. Some would say I was cocky. I had marked in my calendar when to start planting, I had been given many different packets of seeds by friends and family. I was going to plan better, plant better. I wanted to see progress. But then we were thrown into a global pandemic and my plans kept getting pushed to one side. There was a shortage of toilet roll and meat and baking ingredients and, what mattered the most, compost. But I persevered, sitting in the sun on my balcony in my underwear digging and planting and repotting. It was sunny from March through to June and even in spells over the rest of the Summer and September. Plants bolted, no radishes or rocket made it through. But beans thrived and purple carrots powered on. And when we couldn't leave our homes I sent seeds to friends in the post who sent seeds back and I felt like I was part of a community of growers, people who got excited over heritage tomatoes and heartbroken over a failed cucumber plant.
This season started in a new house, a bigger garden, no grass or dirt but lots of decking. It didn't feel like my space, living with other people who had different designs and plans, a different relationship to outside and to growing. But I bought a greenhouse and painted it purple. I can see it from my window and it reminds me to care for the seedlings within. I started to learn about border plants and shrubs and climbers and shade tolerance. I asked the girls I live with if I could make the garden beautiful and as they started to see what I was doing, they let me have free reign. There isn't much sun and the harvest won't be much more than the balcony, but I am learning about flowers and landscaping, starting to think about beauty and not just what I can eat.
And then I got an email saying that I could choose an allotment. A strip of land that was just my own with real grass and real soil and trees planted straight in the ground. I'm so excited! I have arranged to pick up my key tomorrow morning. I have started to make big plans, finally thinking long term with perennial vegetables and fruit trees. But I have grown since I started this journey in 2019. My expectations are different. I no longer expect everything to work out well or for things to fall into place. I want to learn and I want to journey with this new space I have. As much as it is mine, I want to bring other people into it. Children I work with, my nieces, my housemates and colleagues- slowly I am getting better at sharing. And I am researching and working with the land more, thinking about permaculture forest gardens and nitrogen fixers and companion planting. I still have the joy of chucking seeds in soil, but I'm starting to be more intentional. It feels like progress.
I don't talk about my work on here, but there is not a lot of hope in my day-to-day job. Planting from seed, hands in the dirt, life springing up around me, I can be hopeful. I am so grateful for a new space and I am so grateful that in the midst of mourning a relationship I found something that makes me so happy. Somewhere I can thrive. Somewhere I can grow.
The day I chose my plot 28/04/21
