In May

Scattered cognition and absent maintenance

My interview in Tricycle: The Buddhist Review has just been published. Read it here • Take out or renew an annual subscription in April, and you’ll be entered into a prize draw to win a lovely box of goodies.

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I celebrated May Day in a sea fog that had rolled into my garden for the second morning in a row. We did not go to wake Jack-in-the-Green on the beach this year. None of us could quite face the extra burst of effort it would have required.

We are currently a little patched-together in this house. H is anaemic and running on one lung, and has to rest for most of each day. He’s opted to spend his reclining hours in Bert’s room, where he is convinced that Tony the Bearded Dragon likes watching Stargate with him. Yesterday, he switched to Andor, and reported that Tony seemed despondent. I wondered aloud whether he might prefer something more desert-themed, like Dune, or Mad Max, or Lawrence of Arabia.

H’s convalescence is a challenge for everyone, not least because he’s the only one who can parlay with the heating system. Water is dribbling from an overflow pipe in the loft, running across the kitchen roof and into our dining room, which is actually a terrible old conservatory that we were supposed to remove decades ago. I spend my days tripping over an array of bowls and tubs, laid out to catch the drips. The water ends up on the floor either way, whether directly from the roof, or when I kick over the containers. I’m not truly sure why I bother.

Meanwhile, my glasses are held together with surgical tape after a screw sheared off, and the surgical tape is homeless, after I set the first-aid box alight on Monday. This happened because I forgot to turn off a gas ring, and then set the box down on top of it. By the time I noticed the weird smell in the kitchen, the flame had burned a hole through the bottom, and it was alight on the inside, a strange lamp made of bandages and adhesive dressings. Bert found me dousing it in the sink, swearing loudly.

The first-aid box was out because I cut my finger slicing bread, something I’ve done several times this week. I never usually have this problem, but my mind is on other things. Yesterday, I couldn’t find my car keys, and knew immediately where they’d be: in the ignition, the car unlocked, and - bonus incompetence! - the handbrake off. Apparently I can’t even give my car away, which is probably a blessing in the current circumstances. I am subject to a chain of scattered cognition and absent maintenance. I feel as though I’m decomposing.

Meanwhile, though, the garden is burgeoning, and I am spending more and more of my time tending to it. I’ve written before that I’m terrible at it, but this year, something has clicked. When I interviewed Camille Dungy last year, she told me that gardeners don’t expect everything to grow. Some plants thrive, and some plants fail, and you don’t truly get to plan. By seeing my garden as a grand experiment, I’ve started to love it. It is not in my control; nothing like it. In fact, it seems to have a mind of its own, a life of its own. I merely make offerings to it - plants, dousings with the hose, the incessant pulling of bindweed - and it chooses whether or not to accept my tributes.

All things speak, in one way or another. My garden speaks loudest in spring, as it undertakes a spectacular effort of growth. On May morning though, in billowing fog, it was silent, hushed, reverent. In silence, it showed me what can still be made when life is clouded-over, when the whole world seems impossibly still.

What I’m loving in May:

• Bluebells and wood anemones.

• Planting a shade garden.

• This tiny Marimekko mug, a gift to myself, and exactly the right size for my daily allongé.

• The swifts returning to my street for the summer.

• The Commotion podcast. It’s a vibe more than an arts show.

• Feeling like I understand the papal election because I watched Conclave.

• Many, many books, including: Cunning Folk by Tabitha Stanmore, Hark by Alice Vincent, Gossamer Days by Eleanor Morgan, Seekers of Wonder by Elena Emma Sottilotta, Michel the Giant by Tété-Michel Kpomassie.

• Early strawberries and raspberries with cream.

• Listening to Public Enemy in the car with Bert.

• This book of Nightmare Before Christmas knitting patterns by Tanis Gray. I bought it - egged on by my dear son - and now I’m a bit daunted.

The Out of Sheer Rage/ True Stories Book Club resumes next week. I’ll see you then!

Take care,

Katherine

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