Picking wildflowers

Having been raised on a farm, there was, and still is, an appreciation of the generosity of nature.  The garden produce in terms of bushels of green and yellow beans, was processed and became our food in the winter.  Despite being unsprayed and therefore often accompanied by worms, apples became sauce and the jars lined the fruit cellar along with peaches and pears.  On the larger scale, wheat and oats and barley were stored in bins to be ground into a coarse flour which was fed to the pigs.  Bales and bales of hay were gathered from fields and stacked in the barn above the cows, ready to be dropped through the floor and enjoyed by the bovines all winter.  My Father planned tilling and fertilizing to optimize yields and perpetually fretted over the weather.  The connection between what grew and our life was very real.

But the blessings of nature were also so much more than just the food we gleaned or the profits farming brought.  My Mother had flower gardens, and when I was old enough and interested enough, I had my own garden when I tended my favourites, lupins and foxgloves among the plantings of forsythia and honeysuckle.  In the early spring there was a burst of daffodils, followed by peonies with their extravagant blooms so large that without support, the red mops drooped to the ground.  Marigolds were an easy summer annual, lasting well into the fall.  One section was devoted to four-o-clocks which opened on time every afternoon. My love of gardening grew.

In my own homes, there were always gardens, successes and failures.  I remember pulling out an entire bed of oriental poppies because I thought they were thistles growing.  My first contact with a hosta I tried hacking out at the side of the swimming pool we inherited in London -- unsuccessful.  When I couldn't get rid of it easily, I decided to embrace it and even brought it to the house in Millgrove to anchor the rock garden against erosion.  Rhodies and azaleas totally astounded me and therefore received prime spots in the gardens. The standard joke was that I should just wrap the whole garden in burlap -- it would be easier than doing all the rhodies and azaleas separately.  Even now, the azaleas along the side of the house get special chicken wire cages to protect them from the rabbits.

But there is something very special about fruit or flowers freely received.  The apples along the trail or the black raspberries on the roadside are a totally generous gift of the natural world.  When I walk with the grandchildren, in Hamilton or in Sweden, we pick wildflowers and delight in the variety and colour. 

And so, yesterday, having slowly made my way up the mountain in my granny gear, beside the field with cows, I picked three different roadside flowers, stuck them in my pack and carefully pulled them out back at the hotel.  They are not as perfect as ones I could buy, but they embody nature's generosity and the beauty of this island.