life on the hill (III)

Spring has sprung – though you wouldn’t think it from looking out the window.

But if you take a stroll outside the signs are everywhere – have been, in fact, since late December, when one of the small oaks sprouted some new leaves before it had even shed all its old ones. 

Little oak

(The Fool is as sceptic about climate change as the next rabid denialist, but there are times when I wonder).


Come mid-February sprouting is widespread, led, as ever, by the big ash – the first tree to have been planted on the hill, a descendant of the one at Grandmother’s house, nursed in the city for a couple of years, transplanted to the Hill when it was about 5 foot-high, and now a 20-foot beauty. Its roots will, in time, threaten the foundations of the adjacent terrace, and perhaps of the House itself – as did those of its ancestor, which had to be cut down before it completely uprooted the granite pond. I knew that when I planted it, and blithely did it anyway, confident that any future problems won’t be for me to deal with.

Ash

Box

One of the Princess' cactii. What's with girls and cactii?
Do their spikes remind them of the spikiness of their own hearts?
Do they feel an affinity?

Ice plant, originally from South Africa, now common to seafronts
all around the Med and the Atlantic

Plum tree, planted a year ago

Bay laurel, essential for the kitchen

Tulip tree, originally from North America, the latest tree to have been planted
on the Hill, and another descendant of one from Grandmother's place, 
itself a descendant of one still extant at the ancient family seat.

Virginia creeper. "A doctor can bury his mistakes, but an architect can only
advise his clients to plant vines.", Frank Lloyd Wright

I don’t really like Spring – a brash, windy, disagreeable season when compared to the sweetness of Autumn or the cold crispness of Winter. But since having become a gentleman farmer (yeah, right) even I sometimes find a degree of enchantment at the “rebirth of Nature”, as they say, and have to acknowledge that some few balmy days amidst the turmoil do make one glad to be alive.