Hit the Dirt; Reading From A Gentle Plea For Chaos.

Hi this is Claire Ackroyd and hit the dirt. I have a lovely book to read to you from today which is called a gentle plea for chaos. It's written by a lady called Mirabelle and to my sort of surprise and pleasure I find that she was having tea with my mom recently I called my mother and said oh guess who is here because she is a lady who gardens in the same town that my mom lives in a beautiful part of England. And this is a new book to me a new book on the market and it is a lovely one. And as her title suggests she is pleading for us to be less regimented in our gardens. And here is a excerpt from the sort of introductory part of the book. Looking around gardens. How many of them can be said to lack that quality that adds an extra sensory dimension for the sake of orderliness. There's an antiseptic tightness that characterizes the well-controlled gardener and I go further and say that usually the gardener is male. Men seem to be obsessed with order in the garden more than women. They are preoccupied with the flower bed edges that cut with the precision of a pre-war haircut or once they get hold of a history within seconds they have guillotine those tender little growths on health and a high stock of hedges that add to the blurring and

enchantment of a garden in early June. The very soul of the garden is shriveled by jealous regimentation off with their heads go the ferns lady's mantle of cranes build a mania for neatness a lust for conformity and the way you go atmosphere and sensuality. What is left Earth between plants. The dreaded tedium of clumps of color with Earth in between and so the garden was reduced to merely a place for plants individually each is sublime undoubtedly for a plant. When this is heaven. But where is the lure and where alas is seduction in gooseflesh on the arms. There is a place for precision naturally architectural lines such as those that form hedges walls possible Popery are the bones of a garden. But is the artist who then allows the shovel meant an abandonment to evolve. People say gardening is the one occupation over which we have control. Fine but why over indulge ourselves. Control is vital for the original design and form and the ruthless strength of mind is essential. When you have granted some hideous thing you lack the courage to demolish. But there is a point where your steadying hand should be lifted and a bit of native vitality be allowed to take over.

Cottage gardens used to have this quality by the naturally evolved planting brought about by the necessity of growing hopes fruits and trees cabbages and grows praise. Monks and their would be hollyhocks and honestly companions and pinks. How rare now to see a real cottage garden. It is far more difficult to achieve than a contrived garden. It requires intuition and a genius for letting things have their head. We are too clever by half. We read too many books we make too many notes. We lie too long in the bath planning gardens. We have lost how we lost our faculty for impulsiveness have we lost that intuitive feel for the flow and rightness of things our awareness of the dynamics of a garden in which things scatter where they please. This brings me to another observation which I think goes with my original longing for a little shambles here and there seems the proper gardeners never sit in their gardens dedicated and single minded the garden draws them into its embrace where their passions are never assuaged unless they are on their knees. But for us the NCAA is the improper people who plant and drift prune and amble. We fritter away little dollops of time sitting about our gardens benches for sunrise seeds for contemplation

resting purchase of the pure sublimity of smelling the evening air or merely ruminating upon a distant shrub. Freedom to logos with random gardening. And it goes with a modicum of chaos that I long to see here and there in more gardens. So when I make a plea of having what could be lost merely the pristine appearance of a garden kept highly manicured which could be squandered for amiable disorder just in some places just to give a pull at our primeval senses. A mild desire for emotions confusion which will gently infiltrate in given time. Will one day set the garden singing. So here's to a little chaos in your garden and don't feel bad if things are a little untidy and enjoy planning this if you're lonely and I will talk to you again in a week you've been listening too.