Losing the Plot by Allan Jenkins

Losing the Plot
By Allan Jenkins

Healing a new loneliness in land. Healing an old loneliness in me. Gardening (mostly) saved my life, the caring for small things like I had once hoped would happen for my brother and me. But never more so than now this year.

This summer too has meant exile. First, three weeks in Denmark, where my mother-in-law is very poorly. Self-discharged from hospital, her treatment now only opioids and oolong tea I bring with me. We have a wooden beach house there, a quiet, perfect place in a Scandinavian paradise. Hunkered close to the coast, a short walk to wild roses and skylarks, to sunset over the sea; a quick bike ride from the harbour fish shops and cinnamon pastries.

We have crafted a meadow there and planted trees. It has always been a sanctuary. Yet now is the summer of Jaws. The happy water with swimming kids and sand buckets thrumming with a dark undercurrent of menace. Something hidden, submerged, this way comes. Goldcrests flutter while death sits close, drumming bony fingers.

We are quarantined on our return home. Confined to the house. I have a piece of land at the top of Hampstead hill by the Heath where I grow flowers and food, tear peas and peace of mind. Yet for an anxious fortnight I am exiled. Summer in a garden Siberia. I lie pining for the plot.

I think land has its own energy, an elemental identity. But it cannot understand absence, all it knows is the neglect. An abandoned plot can quickly retreat. It can fast harbour hurt, go to seed, revert to weed. It only understands trust.

I LOVE THIS PIECE OF
LAND. IT IS ABOUT ME
BEING THERE, WORKING
TO HELP CREATE A SOIL
WHERE PLANTS WANT
TO GROW

I am not a technical gardener, I don’t believe in the RHS. I grow biodynamically. My gardening is about faith and feel and fidelity. I had hoped, of course, it would be fine on its own for a while. I had friends visit regularly to feed and water. We WhatsApped from the site. For five long weeks, with most everything sown by early June for summer.

Finally I arrive, mid-July, heart beating, guiltridden. And there she is in high summer glory: spiked with red orache and sunflowers, pea wigwams, rows of red tagetes, but slightly ragged, rough around the edges, a bit matted like a long-lost cat.

It wasn’t like it had been left alone. But it hadn’t been me that had been there. My plot was now like a foster child, misplaced in the care system. The beans had failed. Small plants orphaned, attacked by aphids, stunted by snail attack, unprotected from predators. It was like the allotment had somehow slightly given up. Perhaps it had pined for me like I pined for it.

I renewed my vows, visited almost every day, early mornings and late evenings. I put in the hours, and did the work. But somehow I couldn’t break through the resistance. I restocked beans but they didn’t grow, skinny vines hung limply. I threw everything at it. I pleaded forgiveness. I sprayed herbal ‘teas’. I stirred the biodynamic power preparations. But it still didn’t work. It was as though I was being punished. Still doing penance, prayers unsaid, hail Mary, our Father. Next, the peas dried and died off early, shrivelled, shrunk. The nasturtiums, too, lost vitality. My failure was viral.

I reflected, refocused. I love this piece of land. It has never been about the food, the vibrant biodynamic vegetables, the endless bags of spicy salad leaves, unearthing perfect new potatoes. It was – and is – simply about me being there, working to help create soil where plants might want to grow. Fashioning a fertile environment. About helping, say, a morning glory tendril find the right twig or corn stem to cling to. About me clinging on to that.

We turned a corner a couple of days ago. All the new-sown seed burst through. The sunflowers have shot up. You could see and feel the shift. The beans cling to their climbing frames. New thick shoots are breaking through. I have cleared the dense, clogged space, opened up light and air, sown rows of autumn leaves. The sweet peas are abundant, my mornings filled with scent. I may have been finally forgiven. My heart is full, the fall beds too. We will survive this time. A lesson learnt. Love your plot, be constant, faithful, true. It is the only way to be.

Plot 29: A Memoir by Allan Jenkins is published by HarperCollins