November Musing - 'An Easeful Approach To Autumn'

"Apart from those fronds prickling my conscience to do something about them , I ignore the words 'Tidying Up The Garden before Winter', with their nauseatingly prissy undertones . My ears are covered. I know that's what we should be doing in autumn: we should be clearing up the garden and leaving it ship-shape, with as much efficiency as some people clean the house , or their motor- cars on Sunday. 'Do it before winter', we are cautioned .....

Here, with my ideals turned towards easeful loving, there's a kinder climate and somehow find I don't bother until spring. And then it's too late to be a serious undertaking. Anyone can change their attitude of mind; if gazing out of the window in November, you think the place looks a shambles, comfort yourself with the knowledge that those untidy seedheads will look unbelievably miraculous outlined in rime. The sedums, lady's mantle, rose heps, twigs, stalks and stems - all the shabby eaves and the skeletons of radiant blooms left over from last summer - when outlined by frost will transform your habitual setting into somewhere unfamiliar. You will feel that you have never walked there before. Why not try it? Don't confirm to this tidying up business, but move into the territory of slothfulness. Inertia and a laid-back philosophy do have their moments. And this is one of them. From a home for shamefully neglected debris your garden will one day in winter be turned into a place of beauty, a place that is denied your neighbour, with his clean earth full of clumps of shorn stubble."

Extract 'From A Breath From Elsewhere' by Mirabel Osler.

Illustation - 'Autumn Garden, Norfolk' by Angie Lewin.