This week I have been staying with my M&D in their Suffolk home.
Since they have a big beautiful garden, and they are surrounded by Nature in all its oceanic and rural abundance, I thought it would be easy to find a topic to write about. But it has turned out to be too difficult to pick one thing. Should the blog mention the gorse flowers that smell of coconut, the polite mating rituals of swans, or foamy white blackthorn blossom?
So instead I'd like to make a general observation.
While I wrestled with some pastry (another story) my mum went on an excursion to the gardens of a stately home with her gardening group, and my dad got the ladder out and brought a tall shrub back under control with some lethal looking hedge clippers.
When mum came back we all had a cup of tea and talked about walled gardens, planting new orchards, and did dad really know what he was doing.
Thus gardens and gardening have allowed these two people to be themselves. Dad got to be heroic and mum got to be with friends and consider History.
I'm sure there are other ways they could have done this. Perhaps it might involve art galleries and museums, or workshops and evening classes, or even bingo halls and pubs.
But is it Gardening that will keep them healthy and happy the longest?
Let's hope so.
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