We’re blessed to have a larger-than-usual garden (for these parts). Legend has it that when they built this development at the arse-end of the 1980s, what-was-to-become our plot was down for 2 (or even 3) houses, but they didn’t get planning permission for that, so we ended up with double the regulation size garden.
It’s not some manicured mansionly acre, but a rising jumble of joyousness and birdsong and weeds and flowers and trees. Definitely trees. You can’t have too many trees, we say to ourselves, more frequently than is perhaps healthy.
And we can always find space for one more, although I’ve been saying “But we don’t have room” for at least the past 6 saplings we’ve put in.
We planted a walnut tree about five years ago, and we’ve had one nut off it (and the squirrels [fuckersfluffy-tailed tree rats] have had two). It’s somewhat shaded by the vast and mighty laurel out the front of the property, which we don’t want to do anything with because the robins and sparrows and blackbirds live there. But that’s not conducive to walnuts growing quickly.
Jenny says “Maybe we should have another one, in the back garden where it’s sunny.” So she bought me one for Valentine’s day, and now we have another tree.
Squeezed between the less-good cherry, one of the magnolias, and the path.
I’m sure it’ll like it here.
