Hi, I’m Sharon, a lifelong gardener, from walking the garden with my Dad as a child of 10 and asking for the name of every plant to becoming the Senior Gardener at an amazing walled garden and estate in Lincolnshire.

The majority of my most vivid childhood memories are from the garden at my parents home. But if I gather them together the ones that stand out the most are those of nature within the garden not always the actual plants or practices. I cannot hear a Blackbird singing at dusk on a warm summer evening without being transported back to sitting alone under the vast Ash tree and feeling something inside that I could not put into words. 

My go to book as a teen in the 80s was, of course ‘ The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady’ I even kept my own diary and wrote in the style of Edith Holden.. I still have that book.

Life drags you in and of course I had to grow up and go off to do all the things that were expected and somehow I was torn further and further away from that version of me, only pulled briefly back when hearing a Blackbird or a Robin and being transported to the magic of the Secret Garden. It’s easy to dismiss this all as childish memories but why do I feel there’s something more in it all? Especially now in my 50s.

On and off over my years I’ve dabbled with an interest in Druidry or Paganism and read up on Celtic history and old practices but this doesn’t rest easy with me or connect me. I struggle with the idea of rituals ( maybe I’m just too uptight or self conscious) . I really want to mark the festivals but either forget or am too busy. 

One year I tried to grow everything at my allotment biodynamically, watching the moon cycles and sowing or planting when the time was right, but this soon waned (no pun intended) once the madness of May came and inconveniently the moon didn’t fit in with my work calendar. I felt guilty.

Where we live in the flat Fens we are lucky enough to have a huge vista of the Eastern horizon. At times I remember to note the sunrise on its timeline, but more often than not it was seen glaring at me madly in my rear view mirror as I drove to work, as if it was calling at me to make time for it.

Am I searching for connection? There’s so much talk about us losing our connection to nature, maybe that’s it. I am acutely aware that I am distracted and disconnected a lot and long to be more present. 

Last December, my life took a major turn, a simple knee operation going horribly wrong and leaving me with what may now be a permanent but minor disability.

As the light began to return in January and February I watched the garden from my window, I had nothing else I could do, I was forced to just sit and watch the season unfurl as birds visited daily, singing loudly in search of a mate.

In March i lost my father, we weren’t close but he was the foundation for my love of gardening and i felt it rocked who i was to the core. I dug out my old Country Diary and found solace in my teenage nerdyness. 

The sun gained warmth and I took to spending my day sitting in the garden now, watching as the birds gathered nesting material around me, and then fed young and fledged them.

Despite the pain this all felt like a huge privilege to experience, I felt calm and more relaxed than I had felt for years.

Gardening has always been huge for me and who I am, but while I couldn’t actually physically garden it still played a massive part in my healing. So I ponder the question: is it gardening that’s good for us or is it through the garden our connection to the natural world? If so, should we not be more conscious of this when we are in the garden instead of just looking at what needs doing or changing?

I’ve been wanting to write a book for a long time, you’d think with my long recovery I could have done it then but my brain was too fogged and perhaps it wasn’t a time for doing, it was a time for resting and observing and just being. 

But now the time feels right, I have a picture in my mind of my book, I just don’t  know how to bring everything together or if it even makes sense.

So welcome to my blog. I’m hoping this will magically turn into something that’s been inside me all my life as I share with you each month in my garden.