back to work – Lili Barras-Hargan

Gardening Journal – Entry 18

Monday 18 January 2021

After a weekend of not doing much and staying at home, as per government guidelines, I had a really hard time getting to sleep. After tossing and turning half the night, I woke up at 4:30am. Feeling terrible and absolutely shattered. Still, I’m a stickler for routine, so I got my weights out and did a bit of exercise to wake up my brain, before breakfast.

This week I’m working without Laurence, as he’s on annual leave, writing new music. Working alone can be nice, especially on days like this, when you’re operating on about four hours of sleep and aren’t capable of cohesive speech! Still, I miss having someone to bounce ideas off, chat with and help me lift heavy things as well!

Today I worked on a site that is split onto two levels. On the lower level, there is a lawn, an ornamental pear tree, a coppice-style planting of Hypericum patulum, Pyracantha coccinea, Berberis julianae and Ilex aquifolium. On the higher level, there is a beautiful magnolia tree, two symmetrical L-shaped beds used for bedding, as well as two herbaceous borders.

I like this garden as it feels quite concealed and private and has a lot of variety in terms of planting types, with the bedding, topiary, lawn, trees, coppice and herbaceous borders. There is even a mini topiary maze, although the lockdown hasn’t been kind to it and it is looking more like a thicket than the manicured Buxus it should be.

Today, I spent a lot of time in the coppice area, clearing out leaves, weeding and giving a nice cultivate. I had to dodge a few poos, courtesy of the police dogs around the corner, but on the whole, it was a quick job. I must admit that there was a moment where my springbok rake was so caught up in the shrubs that I felt like screaming, but seeing the job done makes you totally forget the pain of it.

Tomorrow, I won’t be working on my Tod, as I’ll be joined by another member of the team. I’m looking forward to having a chat and getting to know them a little better. Hopefully I can get a bit more sleep tonight so I don’t scare them with my eye bags.

Gardening Journal – Entry 17

Tuesday 12 January 2021

Today was much of the same as yesterday. This time year, the jobs are quite limited, as a lot of the plants are dormant and growing at a snail’s pace.

I started by weeding a small winter bedding display full of Erysimum. It didn’t take long and after giving it a little cultivate, we were done. We noticed that soil was very soft, which is a rarity in a usually busy area, where beds tend to get a pummelling from heavy footfall. I believe this soil has a better structure than some more compacted beds because it is so narrow, making it a rare site where all work can be done from the concrete surrounding it.

After that, I worked on a bed on the second level. This was filled with herbaceous perennials like Euphorbia characias and our trusty friend the Anemone x hybrida. There was also a beautiful magnolia tree, bare of its leaves, but boasting beautiful furry buds, ready to spring open in a few months. This bed had a smattering of weeds, both annual and perennial, which were easy enough to hoe off or dig out, respectively.

We started by cutting back the euphorbias, as they were looking scraggly and were due a cut in autumn! We were careful when cutting these, as the photosensitive toxic sap is not something you want to be getting in your eyes, or anywhere on your face for that matter! Then, I moved onto the anemones, cutting back the dead growth, leaving the healthy green leaves to protect the new growth emerging in time for spring.

I then swept up the fallen magnolia leaves, any hoed-off weeds before giving the bed a good cultivate. This bed was in need of some work, and the job is far from over, even now. I always find that little and often is the best approach in gardening, so you catch the small weeds before they become an impenetrable jungle you have to hack through with a machete.

Tomorrow is our study-from-home-college day, which I’m quite excited about. While I love my early mornings and cycling into work while the city is still drowsily opening its eyes, I do appreciate a few extra minutes of sleep and the privilege of staying at home in COVID times.

Gardening Journal – Entry 16

Monday 11 January 2021

This week got off to a bit of crappy start – and I don’t mean I overslept or had an altercation on the cycle in. Today, I shovelled about 5kg of faeces before 9:30am, and it was completely fine. Sure, I almost threw up and laughed at Laurence almost throwing up until I cried, but I felt accomplished. We don’t call our litter rounds litter rounds; we call them ‘cleansing’, and we certainly cleansed the dark corner of that gloomy church today!

Aside from the dirty protest, we spent the day tidying up one of our sites. It was amazing to manage our tasks independently, work together to get the job done and look back on our work at the end of the day.

We started by clearing a herbacous perennial bed of weeds. There was a lot of Cardamine hirsuta with a touch of Stellaria media mixed in. Now that we have the opportunity to work at our own pace and independently, we also have the chance to use every task as revision. In this case, we tried to name every weed we pulled out. Aside from a couple of Bellis perennis here or there, we were lucky to be working with only annual weeds. This meant that the job was a little quicker, as we only had to tear off the growth above ground and needed our trowels every now and then for a stubborn root system.

After clearing the border of weeds, cutting back the Anemone x hybrida and giving it a quick rake, we cultivated it lightly. There was a little soil capping, due to the rainfall in recent weeks so after the little scratch we gave it, the beautiful purples and limes of the Heucheras popped against the dark, rich soil and made the border feel more like a feature and less of a bed of decay.

I created a clear divide between the border and the lawn by cutting the edge with edging shears. I later did this all the way around the lawn and the difference was amazing. I am more convinced every day that a little cultivation and a nice, sharp edge can make even the most neglected gardens look well-loved again.

We finished off by clearing the fern and grass beds of fallen leaves from the deciduous trees and then cultivated the soil before sweeping up. Then we loaded the wheelbarrow with our tools and went off to shovel another poo into another bag. It’s always good to start your day as you mean to go on.

Gardening Journal – Entry 15

Monday 4 January 2021

Happy new year – and what a year 2020 was! It’s funny how quickly the human brain can adapt. Last year (so glad I can finally write that), everything was turned on its head. Cities went into lockdown, people lost their jobs and loved ones left us. What was once a distant idea became our day to day lives. We changed our habits and, in turn, the world changed too. Aside from the pandemic, I have also noted the speed at which I embraced my last two weeks off.

I was on annual leave for the last two weeks of the year and most of that time was spent in bed, or waiting to be in bed. I feel restored, rejuvenated and ready to take on everything it has to throw at me.

Today we worked on leaf clearing, as can be expected after a couple of weeks with limited staff during the festive season. We used backpack leaf blowers to clear some Salix babylonica leaves which had come down in Storm Bella. I can’t quite believe how far I have come using machinery. This time last year, I was dreading the use of two-stroke and four-stroke machinery. I had done a little too much research h and seen too many machinery related injuries. Now – with enough Health and Safety Legislation in my head to sink a ship – I know how to identify the hazards and risks and minimise them. Happy days!

January tends to be the time that I reflect on my progress over previous years and it has brought me some comfort to know that while the world stood still in 2020, so many of us took huge strides individually and came out of it slightly battered, but with more resilience than ever.