Que Sera Sara?

The Gardens

Posted by smgrady on March 21, 2012 · 1 Comment 

The garden is absolutely the best thing about our house.

It’s a shared garden – a football shaped greenspace created in the hollow between two concave crescent roads, accessible by application to the inimitable (and slightly absurd) Garden Committee.

I’d much prefer a backyard of my own, but in this city I’m willing to take what grass I can get. I’m glad of a patch of semi-privacy in which to read and picnic.

It’s very, very New Town. All manicured lawns and politely commanding signs.

This tree is my favourite. It’s utterly enormous. At least 5 or 6  storeys tall, around it’s easily the armspan of two people.

Plus, it’s a local bit of history.

I spend a good portion of my time in our garden, shared or no.

It has quite literally been my saving grace.

The year my hormones went mental and I battled a crushing depression, it was my one solace.

Everyday I’d make myself walk the garden, even if I didn’t get dressed or otherwise leave the house.

Watching the daily shift from winter to spring – the sap run, the buds burst, the first petals fall – these tiny, incremental changes brought me back to myself. Helped me find my way when things felt dark.

The hazy, warmth of waking up to life after was garden-bound too – suddenly finding myself wanting to climb trees and hearing the birds as if for the first time.

It was like Sleeping Beauty but with less fairies and more crying.

So anyway, this garden is special to me.

It’s probably my favourite place in the whole city.

This morning was the first time I’ve been able to breakfast and yoga out there this year, a ritual I sorely miss in the dank winter months. It feels like coming home.

Plus, this afternoon I spotted my first butterfly of the season and found the delicate remnants of a robin’s egg.

It’s been utterly lovely.

What a perfect beginning to Spring.