Grassing Up...

...Gardening [see previous] is not a Palladian strength. 'Outdoor housework' is the most creative I can ever feel on the subject. Perhaps in large part my reticence is based on the garden being simply a 'spare' room, one that one would love to dedicate more time to and in but simply hardly ever visited the pressures of life and busyness being too pressing.

H did sufficiently harangue me last month on the decayed state of the outdoor room's furniture - some elegant if unused tables and chairs fit for summer's evening dinner parties that never quite seem to happen - for me to dedicate two entire weekends to stripping then varnishing the lot. (And yes, it 'does do what it says on the tin', but what it doesn't say on the tin is that if you wear sandals whilst using you will find feet indelibly stained with the splashed stuff!)

That apart - plus a few annual musings on the glory of home-grown fruit, musings that rarely if ever come to any fruition in themselves [see very previous] - the one hot spot has been a renewed determination to make of the front lawn something other than a dry desert or blasted heath or some combination of the two.

Whosoever built the rectory clearly did not take account, when laying out the front lawn, that the house itself blocks most of the sunlight most of the year. Add to that three large trees - preserved by Heaven and the local council from any alteration - and you end up with near total, enduring shade resulting in much that is bare and what is not bare no more sward-like than a good covering of moss can make it. Which is, you understand, very little.

Not quite sure how or why, but it suddenly became a life imperative to rescue this barren land this year. Vast quantities of specially shade-loving grass seeds have been added to a deeply and lovingly prepared and nourished top soil, all carefully and consistently watered each day at dusk.

The result has been quite alarming! For there, behold, is a grass-green lawn with little seedlings shooting up all over the place. Passers-by have become quite accustomed to finding their Rector stooped over his lawn uttering kindly and encouraging noises to the growing verdant swathe. (Such slightly deranged behaviour in a cleric is always to be encouraged, giving as it does a faint air of other-worldliness, which is generally - if often mistakenly - taken by others as an odour of sanctity.)

The downside though is of course that one becomes as fiercely protective of this growing yet vulnerable progeny as any lioness of her cubs. Ever vigilant and poised to strike at need, mighty roars are let out should any creature dare to venture too close to the precious being - me not lionesses that is.

Post- and milk-persons have swiftly learnt no longer to assay a shortcut to the front door across the grass. Window cleaners have been taught through example not to leave their buckets there either. But if lawns as well as liberty demand the price of eternal vigilance, then sadly one cannot always cough up the cost.

For on returning to the front parlour the other moment for one more watchful gaze, imagine my shock and horror to see a clear line of seedling-damaging footprints right over the whole thing from one side to t'other. The vanishing back of a junk mailer - evidence backed up by the sight of acres of such junk freshly landed on the porch floor - had me at once legging it out the front door to confront and condemn forthwith the assailant.

That my utterly reasonable and rational ranting at the fellow as to his loose behaviour in general and unwarranted incursion on my little lawn in particular was met with no more than a shrugged shoulder and a not so murmured - truly he said it - "Am I bovvered" - so made me wish that on a wide interpretation of 'muscular Christianity' I would have been within my rights to have decked him on the spot!

But I have recognised the oik - a not so fragrant youth from a not so fragrant family in a neighbouring - and yes, far less fragrant than our own - village. And a plan of revenge is being plotted even as I write.

For they possess an allotment in which they grow much produce. (They also have an allotment shed in which I am sure they hide much contraband, though that is another matter.)

I shall sneak over in dead of night and sow ten packets of the hardiest grass seed I can find. No more marrows or parsnips for them - just endless, indestructible lawn!