Do you know the first words that appear on my screen when I open the substack app read: “What’s on your mind?” They come before the button I must select that reads “Create new post”. The funny thing is…it’s almost question enough to put one off…because there are a thousand things on my mind and it sends me into a complete spin! As you know…where to begin, is always a confounding enough issue anyway…and today, that question posed seems to have usurped all previous thoughts. My mind is now completely blank! Where is that laughing-til-you-cry emoji???? I don’t think I can insert emojis into these posts!
But truly? What’s on my mind? It began clear enough, ‘til I opened instagram to check messages; to find a post at the top of my feed, written by a dear friend, saying that Israel had bombed the Catholic Church in Gaza…the one whose Priest the late, previous Pope used to telephone every day during this continuing state of war. This was a follow-up post to the one she issued yesterday, about free speech being eroded in the UK, and articulating a fear that has gripped me too, all week, since our own Government’s appointment of a Special Envoy to combat anti-Semitism in this country. There seems to be such confusion between the understanding and meaning of anti-settler and anti-Zionist commentary, as opposed to anti-Semitism which is an entirely different thing. It seems to me most sound-thinking peeps bear no grudge whatsoever towards those who practice the Jewish faith…and surely we have all been well-educated in this country over the last many decades about the Holocaust? Our empathy towards the Jewish community (certainly during my lifetime) has seemingly known no bounds and indeed it’s Holocaust survivors themselves who speak out against the war Israel is waging on Gaza and beyond. Even early leaders of the state of Israel warned against expansionism. Of course I condemn the recent acts carried out against all places of worship and people of the Jewish faith, indeed any and all faiths (and anyway, I myself carry a generational strain of Jewish blood).
Even though it is a topic that weighs heavily on my mind, I really don’t want to get bogged down in it here…’tis not the reason you join me here on this platform and I feel neither qualified or articulate enough to write on the subject, where my friend has stepped in to do so with clarity. How I support her for doing so, succinctly, fearlessly and publicly. Like so many…I feel quite powerless in the face of the ongoing, relentless assault on fellow humans and our media must not be constrained in their portrayal of the situation. I don’t expect to be denied access to both sides of the story in this country of fervent multiculturalism and interviews with the newly appointed Special Envoy have me very concerned: (ie if she had her way, would the ABC have been able to screen their story of a brave Australian volunteer nurse, guiding us around the partial remains of a hospital in Gaza where she is trying, under extraordinary circumstances, alongside fellow volunteers, to aid the wounded and dying, many of them children?). I’m not sure.
Next in the morning’s bombardment, came news of the death of Connie Francis…setting my mind on an altogether different tangent…that of Sunday afternoon movies (which caused me to question and reprimand myself at how I too, can be so easily distracted). I do live in a constant state of contradiction and know I’m not alone. Thank goodness for the garden.
So on a more lighthearted note which is way more my forté (if you’ve got this far and are still with me - truly I imagine I will see ‘emails disabled’ in droves): do you recall those old black & white days that really do seem so very distant now? Did you too (those of you who are my vintage anyway!) used to eagerly scan the weekly TV guide to see what ‘old movie’ might be shown on a Sunday afternoon? Winter Sundays anyway. (Woe betide the Sundays when competing channels were showing two favourites and one had to choose between them!). Back in those days, the only likely way to see an old movie was to catch it on the telly. And oh how I was a fan of those movies that preceded my own generation. I can’t say there was a specific Connie Francis one (I’ll need to go on a search); but how I adored all the Elvis ones, along with the like of South Pacific, Oklahoma, Calamity Jane - well anything with Doris Day, Audrey Hepburn…oh for a screening of Roman Holiday…or Summer Holiday (we’re all going on a…!) and especially all those rom-com-teen American beach ones. They went along with afternoon TV shows like Gidget, the Flying Nun, Mr Ed, I Love Lucy and goodness knows how many more that preceded The Partridge Family and Happy Days. But it was the elegance of those earlier ones that really held me captive as a young teen - I mostly felt I’d been born into the wrong era (or….perhaps one could blame those movies for feeling so!). It’s a good long time since I’ve watched any of them and perhaps the music alone is enough to suffice. It’s time to find some Connie Francis songs though, and add her to my library. This video of her singing Where the Boys Are, certainly represents a particular time and place. Though perhaps best viewed through rose tinted spectacles, that clip (above) well conjures the feeling of an era that influenced my upbringing…in the shadow of a great war not so many years past, the kinds of images with which we were so familiar and that cast a sense of understanding and meaning over our young lives. How I would have loved to have a voice like Connie’s. RIP Connie Francis - I don’t think she had an easy life. I was sorry too, when Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys died a couple of weeks ago…another raft of songs I adored, that accompanied my young life and that I still enjoying hearing when they pop up today.
Well…that was a rollercoaster of a start wasn’t it? I guess that’s what’s likely to happen if I don’t look at my images first, which cause me to be vision-led. It seems likely if I don’t, you’re likely to get what’s going on inside my head rather than through my eyes which is not so advisable! Perhaps I won’t try that tactic again and I should ignore that single line that will inevitably greet me each time I log on, to begin a new post!
Back on solid ground…it’s been a week of contrasts…
I think I mentioned I intended tackling the citrus trees in the kitchen garden that had put on so much lax growth since my last pruning effort. It was a huge task and I carried barrow after barrow load out of the citrus enclosure, lightening the load from the first tree from each and every angle, squeezing between the branches and swapping secateurs and saw intermittently, as thickness of branch or stem dictated.
Eventually I coaxed the biggest of the trees into some semblance of order, the other trees being smaller in stature were not quite so out of control! Oh but I’m worried I will have cut off all the possibility of this year’s orange blossom distillation. It couldn’t be helped…the effort gone into fruit production and too much lax growth was taking its toll and at the end of the day, the tree is more important than the distillation. But…I’ll cross my fingers and see what mother nature yields in a few weeks time. I still have a feeling the season may unfurl early, but only time will tell.
I also suggested I’d sow the tomato seeds, which I did! “In July?” Someone asked me. And the answer is indeed a fervent YES! Tomatoes take time, and if you want to grow your own successful crop, don’t allow time to get the better of you. Mine are now sitting covered (so in the dark), on a heat mat in the potting shed. I’ll check them each morning to see if there are any signs of germination (which I don’t expect for at least ten days) but also to make sure the seed raising mix hasn’t dried out.
To my horror, although I searched high and low…I came to the conclusion we must have eaten (who exactly ate?) the last Yellow Pear tomato and not saved seed! Oh what a calamity! So…I’ll have to buy a yellow tomato seedling or two in the spring - there’s little point in buying an entire packet of seed.
But back to the July sowing…if you want to grow your own, it’s best to sow seed into punnets, then when those early seedlings grow to a size where their roots fill the punnet cell, to transfer them into tubes (root trainers)…to grow them on further before planting out - by which stage they should be so sturdy and of such vigour, that they take off! And all of this takes time…
Midweek was filled with a distraction of material and colour-seeking for others. I have to admit, it’s still a task I so enjoy (if not so much these days, the nitty-gritty of following through!). I did have a chuckle a few months ago when Country Style Magazine tagged Glenmore House in an Insta post, describing me as an ex-interior designer! But the thrill of the chase? How I love the accumulation of colours and textures and possibilities that gather on the passenger seat of the car on a ‘Sydney’ day. I can’t help but fidget with the pieces I’ve collected, when stopped at a red traffic light, layering them in alternating order, glancing from time to time as I make my way between fabric houses or flooring suppliers and paint shops…mulling over their combinations before the lights turn green and my attention is back on the road!
The like of imagining workshops and events into life though, has long taken precedence over the accumulation of materials on the passenger seat of the car; and for weeks I’ve been working away behind the scenes on the details of an upcoming gem of a day with a many-times cooking workshop favourite, Angela Palermo, for a celebratory Italian Garden Lunch.
What really had me giggling yesterday though, was…the unintended though timely (as it turned out) release of my newsletter announcing the event, to which I couldn’t resist adding a favourite old image of one of Ange’s splendiferous Lemon Curd Tarts. I’ve been trying to release this event for weeks (but the inclusion of a surprise element has been evading me and caused the release to drag its feet). That the image (added to my draft weeks ago) of a scintillating Lemon Curd Tart launched, in the end, on my birthday, unintentionally brought full circle a longstanding source of amusement between me and Ange over that tart that has so long been a feature of my annual celebration. Just how the Citron tart became my birthday tradition I can’t recall; and although Ange has only ever made one for my actual birthday, and oh my it was such a beauty (below); we seem to have been having the wink, wink, nudge, nudge ‘tart’ conversation during this week each year, for a rather long time now.
Citron tarts aside…when Larry asked what I’d like to do on my birthday…which is always such a conundrum (and most years gone by, one he would delay ‘til the weekend anyway as weekdays as a general rule put paid to doing anything on the actual date, by which time it’s hardly worth the attention!) I hit on the idea of a dozen oysters, a glass of wine and walking to Hornby Lighthouse at South Head!
Funnily enough…given my longtime association with the area, it’s not something I’d ever done! What a misnomer! In all the years on boats, the aspect from the water of that glorious red and white striped lighthouse is one with which I’m familiar, but I don’t recall ever walking the path to it, from the north end of the beach at Camp Cove!
As Larry’s hellbent on wearing-in those hiking boots for his charity walk in Crete later in the year, they had their first (very brief!) meeting with a sandy shore. To date…they’ve rounded the Orbital here many times by now, criss-crossed the paddocks, been up and down the rocky path to the creek multiple times (along with weights in his backpack!) and been taken for the odd walk along our little back road. The short walk to the lighthouse was but a stroll compared to what he’ll be in for in a couple of months time!
The sparkling track of the sun causing the eyes to squint and the gentle frothing waves spilling onto that beach brought back many a childhood memory -
It was winter days such as these that my Mum would take me to play with my bucket and spade on the golden sand….a guarantee there’s almost not another soul about. And there weren’t yesterday either….until we encountered a cast of (not quite!) thousands at the lighthouse itself!
I fantasised for a few minutes, over how a kitchen garden could sit adjacent to the ‘Assistant Lightkeeper’s Cottage’! What a position that house commands…and if seemingly desolate and closed up…its features appear to be cared for and in tact.
The sea swirled around the treacherous rocks below, the coastal Banksias held both flowers and seed pods aloft; and we were a bit taken aback (upon reading one of the information plaques) at the prospect that at one point in the nation’s history, the US was considered a possible enemy that might attack our shoreline! Really? The French yes…the Japanese did. But America? I don’t recall knowing that before! And then Larry fretted over the state of the country’s ability to stave off any attack…(let’s move on!). We did…via the La Bretagne patisserie in Rose Bay, to pick up a little Citron Tart…for the weekend! And then…
I so wanted to show Larry the stone installation I visited (and mentioned here) some weeks ago at the Art Gallery of NSW. An appreciation of rocks and stones and boulders is something we share, and I knew I was being boring in referring back to this work on several occasions when he hadn’t seen it for himself! I also wanted to take him to the other exhibition the gallery has on display by Korean artist Lee Ufan, called Quiet Resonance, that resonated deeply with me too, on that prior visit.
As the sun set behind the bridge (many tourists snapping the view - who could blame them?), I turned my attention instead to…Mrs Macquarie’s Chair…
Which to be honest, was the very first thing on my mind when I woke up this morning!
In case you can’t clearly read the inscription above the seat itself, it reads: “BE IT THUS RECORDED THAT THE ROAD Round the inside of the Government Domain Called Mrs MACQUARIE’S ROAD so named by the Governor on account of her having Originally Planned it Measuring 3 Miles and 377 Yards Was finally Completed on the 13th Day of June 1816”.
So it was that my first clear thoughts this morning (before the world interfered) were concerned with just how Mrs Macquarie may have gone about measuring that distance? She surely can’t have done it with a tape measure!! What are those contraptions with a single wheel? Ahhh….a Surveryor’s wheel or Trundle wheel! Surely she must have had access to one? You might imagine my first thoughts before my eyes were properly open!
And then a little ferry boat plied the sunset waters…and we trundled off to a delicious dinner at Fred’s. I could not have asked for a more purrfect (Larry’s ridiculous b.day card message!) day! Skiving off to play in Sydney…is such a rare thing. It was the most enormous treat….for us both.
Play day over…I’m planning to prune the roses this weekend and…next week’s post may be out of kilter as I have an event to prepare for on Saturday. In the meantime, as ever, I send you warmest wishes for the week ahead.
Mickey x
Productive garden notes:
Eating from the garden:
Tomatoes (yes…still!), coloured chard, spinach, kale - cavolo nero, broccoli, cauliflower, cima di rapa, kohl rabi, parsnip, Jerusalem artichoke, fennel, celery, celeriac, pumpkin, carrot, beetroot; lettuce, rocket, red elk mustard leaves. The first peas. Lemons, oranges (Navel), mandarins, rhubarb (the last a bit thin now). Mint, chives, parsley rosemary, thyme. Calendula, nasturtium and borage petals. Fennel fronds and the first leaves of coriander. Potatoes…still making our way through the unexpected haul.
Going / gone: tomatoes
Seed saving: tomato (I intend to save one more lot - as soon as the San Marzano on the bench ripens…if I can collect seed from that particular fruit, I’ll go with it rather than the seed I sowed as an insurance policy last weekend as this particular specimen is of a unique and substantial size!)
Sowing: tomato seed into punnets
Planting: none
Ornamental garden notes:
Picking for the house: rose pelargonium, a solandra trumpet and…a poor windblown pea stem with flowers attached - it had snapped off and recovered remarkably well in a jar of water, adding a graceful highlight to the kitchen sink all week!
Perfumes and aromas: few this week…the osmanthus has been in hiding, though on a very warm Monday…the first resuming hint of labdanum emanating from the cistus ladanifer crossed the path of my nose…surprise!
Pruning and other: Orange trees aside, I spent ages taking down most of the spent tomato foliage after picking the remaining fruit. Three good specimens are holding on, though I’ll remove all the Sugarlump growth and the last of its fruit tomorrow. Thalia finished pruning back the top of the apple tunnel and went to work on the Perovskia in the Barn Garden, as well as the Nepeta and the Heliotrope in the Arc.
Thank you for those words about the world today, they resonate. And of course many thanks for all the words. I don’t have a garden, except yours!
The most perfect birthday M … loved being transported along via your words . X