The sap rises

Sunshine. Dopamine. Herbicide.

We’ve had a solid week of sunny days, and I wander along contemplating the effect of the sunshine on the human psyche; or rather I was, but I’ve moved on to pondering if I am, in fact, some sort of plant. Perhaps I photosynthesise some important brain chemical?Probably not a plant. More like one of those symbiotic corals which are an animal that use algae to photosynthesise. What would a human would look like if they were to capture algae in their skin?. Enslaved some Cyanobacteria. You’re my chloroplast now. They’d been greenish, for a start, the symbiont humans. They’d probably still need to eat a bit, to get the protein for muscles. In this country they’d probably have to eat quite a lot in winter. Like those hybrid cars.

Wild daffodils are somehow more exciting than the ones I planted in my garden.

There are no ravens today, which is disappointing, but I heard a lapwing in the field; I only saw one, and there’s no sign of nesting, but I’m hoping they will return en masse. And my eye is almost better. The hospital gave me steroid eyedrops so I am expecting some sort of super buff muscular eyeball or superhero vision or something.

The warmth of the sun on my face. A forgotten sensation. This must be how the dead winter trees feel, awakening to the prospect of summer, the sap rising, remembering how to be alive after winter’s coma. A warm breeze ruffles the wood as the trees let out a sigh of relief. The day is jewelled; sapphire above, and emerald below, the woodland floor, transformed into a magical wonderland of enticing paths laced with newly sprouted leaves and mossy crevices undoubtedly stuffed with fairy folk. The bluetits fight and squabble. The woodpecker laughs. Kites scree overhead.

The sparrowhawk scatters and flies to a nearby gatepost as if she was up to no good, or perhaps she just feels it’s undignified for a sparrowhawk to be found on the ground. I can see her clearly. Every now and then I come upon the feathered explosion of pigeon that I assume is her work, and that’s all I ever used to know of her presence. All these years never seeing a sparrowhawk, and here I am seeing her again. Perhaps we are friends now. In this small fraction of the world, all is well.

I’m still a bit ill and very tired, but I am no longer stuck in the mire of despair. Probably because the mire has dried out a lot, like the fields that got all churned up by tractors which I haven’t been able to visit in some months. It’s clear that the huge fences they were putting in are at least in part to to keep deer out, as the fields are now full of tiny trees, which I approve of. It speaks volumes about humanity that I assumed the fences meant the world was yet again degrading. Maybe it is; I mean, you can’t walk there anymore, but I approve of planting woodland and I approve of the little cat-flap like devices that allow small animals passage and the bare fields and the little proto trees surrounded by their plastic sheaths stand in the bare fields and remind me of a plucked bird that is just growing its feathers in because that is the way my mind works (bizarrely, if at all). Growing trees is a recovery, anyway.

Workings

I have listed this guy, the shape of song. I’m pretty pleased with the blind embossing. Definitely looking forward to using that technique again.

Also printed a new batch of these red poppies.

Cormorants

The weather has been decidedly not cormorant weather, and the dormant count has dropped from its maximum height of 5 back to 2.

Findings

I have a lot of houseplants and people will tell me sad tales of how they kill everything, and how do I keep them alive? and I will cheerfully tell them that there is a room upstairs I put the dying ones because I too, kill houseplants. It makes room for the new ones! The truth is that plants die for a lot of reasons, especially in the winter when houses are darker and drier (central heating). There are things you can do to make your plants happier; choosing the right ones for your home and your personality, choosing the right soil, looking up care and most of all understanding that nearly all places inside your house which are not the actual windowledges are,in plant terms, really, really dark.

Choosing the right plant for the right place and it has a better chance of survival, but at the end of the day, a lot of houseplants are designed to live in vastly different environments than an isolated pot in your living room, and unless you happen to live in a tropical understory, they will struggle along for a few years looking worse and worse till they are weakened enough to die of some disease or insect or deficiency, or even old age. They often do this in nature too, they’re just replaced by a more vigorous plant without anyone noticing. Basically, it’s not necessarily your fault, you’ve been set up for failure and have mistaken a living thing with a natural lifespan for permanent furniture.

I managed to morally offend someone on the internet this week by suggesting instead of beating yourself up, or just consigning yourself to a life with only indestructible snake plants for company, you could just accept that some plants are basically a very long lived bouquet and you can simply buy a cheap one and then enjoy it for a couple of years before it goes to the big compost heap round the back of the shed. Apparently I am horrible, to which I would only respond that I also eat plants everyday. I am a veritable unrepentant plant mass murderer.

Anyway, I like a calathea, and calathea do not like me- they don’t like anyone as far as I can, tell unless you live in an automated greenhouse and like tending to your calathea collection 24/7. But they do look good (for a while), so when I see them in Ikea, I buy them- this one is massive and cost £8. It’s my favourite type, with the black and pink leaves I find both irresistible and absolutely impossible to keep looking good in winter because with any condition less than perfect they get incredibly crispy. I’m going to try for perfect conditions, I’ve got 2 different calathea that have come out of winter looking like plants (albeit plants which are decidedly the worse for wear) but I’m not getting my hopes up because calathea are utter bastards. Also, my second love, citrus trees. Utter, utter bastards but still psychologically much easier than being infatuated with bad humans.

Incidentally, they closed the car park to Reading Ikea last weekend and my husband seemed decidedly gleeful; I think he thought I wouldn’t be able to overspend (read:buy plants) if I had to carry all my purchases all the way to the other carpark. Sadly for him I have been working out and women, having been deprived of pockets for centuries, have developed the ability to carry impossible amounts of things with only their hands, for example, an extra large door mat, a A3 picture frame , a calathea, a storage basket and 12 small things called smönclke which were a bargain at 99p even if you’re not sure what they’re used for. Didn’t even buy a blue bag.