I can’t stay in denial any longer. For too long I have pretended to be like everyone else. But I’m not. I love weeding. I love finding a long border full of hairy bittercress and bindweed, and working my way slowly along it. I know, I’m sorry.
Pulling invaders from the soil, roots and all, is satisfying enough. But standing up and seeing a neat, clean border is even better. That’s why I love the Garden from Scratch so much. When I first saw it, on a rainy April day last year, I fell in love with its weediness. It looked so sad and hopeful under all those shoots of bindweed and cushions of grass.
The reason I continue to love weeding is because I have a strategy (and, if I were more introspective, a problem). I weed little and often, and this keeps the bittercress and the boredom at bay. I try to get to the weeds when they are poking through the soil, before they have twined through bushes, and before they have set seed. When they play hide and seek behind bigger plants, I catch them in the act. Once or twice a week, I sweep the garden, picking these weeds before they have established, and chucking them in the council compost bag if they have roots or seeds which might ruin a good compost heap. It sounds like obvious, but I know from previous bitter experience what it’s like to leave a garden and then try to scoop up all the weeds in one go. It doesn’t happen, and the weeds sign a tenancy agreement, and move in for good.
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