Pruned

 

I took the secateurs and the hedge clippers and headed into the stream of consciousness which defines the back wall of our garden. One plant grows into another.

Actually, most of the plants stay put, but there is one which is on the move in both directions. It is a pretty bush, with sort of pointy leaves and small yellow flowers. My neighbour gave it to me from her garden, but I didn’t appreciate that it would try to expand and take over!

So I waded in between a couple of azaleas, which are also being squeezed by the robust ferns which keep implanting themselves in the stone dyke behind. I chopped and I snipped and I reduced the infringing bushes to stumps. But those stumps have roots. Until I get in with the fork and pull out the roots, that aggressive bush will grow again. So will the ferns, or bracken as they’re known in Scotland.

My life can get overcrowded. Things which look good grow up beside things that are good, cramping my time and limiting me. The blooms on the things that are good are diminished, hidden, behind the robust branches of activities and thoughts, new and old, which pinch and push and, when pruned, re-grow with even more strength.

I need help to uproot the good in the garden of my life, so that the best can flourish. I need my father the Gardener. Help!