garden club

I have joined a gardening society.  It might seem odd that I've not done so before, given how keen I am on gardening.  I've been an RHS member for over a quarter of a century, have at various times belonged to the Essex Gardens Trust and the Hardy Plant Society, and am currently enrolled in Plant Heritage, but tonight I filled out my form and handed over my twelve quid to become a member of a garden club.  At the next meeting they'll have a dinky little card ready for me on the desk on the way in, with the year's events listed.

Our village is so small and so spread out it doesn't run to a gardening society.  I think there's conversational French and a book club in the village hall, which is about two miles from us and is on a main road with parking for three cars.  If I wanted a gardening society I was going to have to travel, on which basis I was free to join any garden club within reasonable distance that I liked the look of.  Which is how I have ended up with one on the opposite side of Colchester, drawn by the combined lure of a good programme and the fact that I already know several people there, some via Plant Heritage and some from my Writtle days.

I knew the programme was good even before getting my member's card, because it is on the internet, but with my membership form I was given a separate piece of paper with the year's visits listed on it.  Aha, secret member's only visits, not on the internet.  There is no coach trip like last year's one to Great Dixter, but there are several outings lined up to gardens in East Anglia, some of which tie up with the lectures, which seems a good idea.  So at the start of April we're due to hear somebody talk about his fritillaries and small bulbs, and then later in the month we can go and look at them in his garden.

Tonight's talk was by somebody who worked for eight years as nursery manager at one of the local growers who exhibit at the RHS shows, including Chelsea, and so was responsible for bringing the plants to show condition, as well as helping set up the stands.  It was fascinating and very funny. Her husband's high point came when she was able to get him a pass for press day and Joanna Lumley spoke to him.  One of her lows was utterly failing to recognise Russian oligarch Evgeny Lebedev and grasp that he really did want to buy the entire contents of their Chelsea stand.  It was a blow to both parties when his PA appeared after the show had closed on Saturday with a fist full of fifty pound notes and they had already flogged the contents to the public.

Refreshments after the talk turned out to be free, and instead of biscuits there was tea loaf made by one of the committee members and with the fruit soaked in Early Grey tea.  Really, what's not to like?