The irony of the uncharacteristically good weather during the first week of lockdown was not lost on Sarah. A lifelong sun worshipper she wanted nothing more than to spend the day at the beach, but she kept reminding herself that she was safe at home, and lucky enough to have a garden to enjoy the weather. (Even if she did get trapped outside on the first day for 10 hours, she’s over it now – a week had passed, a lesson had been learnt and life goes on.)
This week, Sarah had seen many memes of mother nature finally healing itself, planet earth seemed to be positively thriving without humans interfering with it. Natural order was being restored: animals were taking over cities and the skies were clear again, something positive was beginning to happen to the planet we all share and are lucky enough to call our home. So Sarah decided that if she couldn’t experience the wonders of the world for herself she would have to create her own backyard paradise instead. A zen garden to rival any – well on this side of the world at least…
After a light breakfast of yogurt and fruit, Sarah put her sunglasses on, grabbed the garden keys and ventured to the shed to dig out her partners old gardening tools. The shed was wooden and had seen better days, there was evidence of rot around the base and the door hadn’t been opened since late last summer, the handle was distinctly cobwebby and didn’t look very inviting. With a deep breath, Sarah tentatively reached out (somehow avoiding all the cobwebs) placed the key in the lock, gave it a turn and click! – She was in. No sooner had she taken 2 steps into the shed, when out scurried 3 mice. EEEEEK! (That was Sarah – not the mice) Sarah loves all creatures great and small but a family of mice is never a good sign, hopefully Smudge would scare them away from the house.
After what felt like an eternity of shed exploration, Sarah finally spotted the tools she needed: a garden rake; a trowel; some gloves; a bag of gravel and a bag of compost. She put the gloves on and quickly gathered everything up and placed it on the lawn. Time to clear a space for her zen garden…
One by one, Sarah lifted the ceramic plant pots from the end of the garden and placed them in an aesthetically pleasing cluster on the patio. As she was carrying the penultimate pot of polyanthus a little bee popped out to say hello. He was disorientated and confused at the sight of a human and unfortunately said hello with his stinger – on Sarah’s nose. Ouch! Sarah dropped the polyanthus pot, narrowly missing her big toe and staggered backwards, stepping on the upturned rake which comically whacked her on the back of the head like something out of carry on film. “Oh my God! What is my life?!?!”
Feeling dejected, Sarah threw her gloves on the ground and trudged back to the kitchen to look for some after bite remedy. She luckily had some at the back of her medicine cabinet, carefully she pulled the stinger out from the end of her nose and put the cream on. She then grabbed a magazine off the counter top and went to the freezer to find a bag of frozen peas. Her head throbbing, she plodded to the living room, placed the peas behind her skull, sat back on the sofa and read her magazine. Another day, another first world problem.
Lockdown Logs 