Garden musings

LIZ CHARNELL

Well I wouldn’t be the first to start with ‘Strange times’, but here I go. 

These are strange times for so many reasons. In moments (when not making salad bags, picking kale, extracting bindweed from the rhubarb, milking the cows even) I find myself standing in a garden with all those familiar sounds, sights and smells that have become ingrained in me, sensing the air is full with what I can only describe as echoes.

I am sure I am not alone in this. Those who work and also live here, farming or gardening, have continued their working lives relatively unchanged throughout these times. The rhythms of husbandry, farming, and growing vegetables, even in uncertain times, are governed by the simple fact that each day repeats itself. The sun sets, the night falls, the sun rises, and so everything grows that little bit more, and what was done yesterday has to be done again today and tomorrow and the next day.

This is what we have been doing while the rest of the world (you) have had to contend with, how should I call it – the pandemic, lockdown, strange and extraordinary times.

And so what are those echoes? For me it is saying, more than ever, to keep things simple.

I came to Plaw Hatch in uncertain times, not like now, but still uncertain. Way back then a group of people came together to work with a set of common principles, and here I am 11 years later. The ‘uncertainty’ then has been replaced with a vibrant business, an influx of young(er) farmers and a change of personnel in some areas. And still the farm wakes each morning and irrespective of all the challenges (believe me there are many), does something extraordinarily simple – grows food in a kind way. 

We all know some of the hardest things to do are some of the simplest things to say…love one another, be kind, listen more, don’t watch so much Netflix, turn your phone off! 

Gus relaxing on the straw bales

For most of my lifetime we (the world, the UK) have strived to make the production of food simple, cheap and affordable without really considering how precious and essential this commodity is. Most of us have been complicit in this, me included. Now I both recognize and understand that this organism called Old Plaw Hatch Farm, which I contribute to, is priceless in its simplicity.

I have not been found rudderless these past months. I have not had to stay inside, watch endless Netflix, read the ever-noisy words of those that always seem to have something to say on anything and everything, nor have I had to ignore it either. I have not had to fill days with jigsaw puzzles or crafting. I have ex-nursing friends whose accounts of hospitals and ICUs have been harrowing.

I have simply carried on producing food, milking cows, walking my dog and feeling like one of the luckiest persons on the planet. I have continued to love this land and what I do. What a gift I have given myself, and what a gift has been given to me. 

As ever we will do our very best to keep the Plaw Hatch produce flowing in these strange times.