In order to achieve this Nirvana, I have reduced wall-to-ceiling bookcases to the building blocks of a cardboard city of skyscraper stacks of boxes. Where some have a small room in their house they term a boxroom, I have a boxhouse! It offered the opportunity to do some reading-weeding and provide an abundant supply of very random books to the Caddington Allotment Library, being successfully built by one Helen Taylor.
After the first room's bookcase was emptied I delivered a mere three boxes, but at that time I knew there were to be more, and a couple of back-breaking days later, another few boxes made their way to the Allotments Library, and I said there might just be a few to follow – I was wrong! I had forgotten that bookcases were to be found on the landing and in my bedroom, so I duly delivered yet more heavy boxes, saying there might yet be a few lonely remainders to follow – wrong again! I made no more promises to Helen and her daughter on their doorstep as I delivered yet another box.
These books had been acquired from my reading, that of my ex-wife and both our deceased parents from their collections. Amongst them, I unearthed a book signed by the entire Yorkshire Cricket team in the early part of the twentieth century and the point of this narrative; a book entitled: 'The Gardener's Enquire Within'. I had put this aside as soon as I spotted its title with the intention of making it a present to one of the gardeners at the Stockwood Discovery Centre, Jan Tysoe. I had made a vow to myself that I would not be creating any more galleries until the packing was completed, but that vow was about to be tested because there was no way I was going to visit the Gardens without a camera at this time of year, so I took only the single camera with the 90mm Tamron macro attached along with the book and sought out Jan without even removing the soft case from the camera.
However, having earlier in the day had a stressful series of phone calls to Insurance companies, the opportunity and the temptation to capture some of the colour and beauty around me, conspired to break my resolve, and the case was stuffed in one pocket and the lens cap in another and shooting began immediately I had handed the book to Jan. It was rewarding that she appreciated it and from the ensuing brief conversation, I knew it had found a new home. As we walked by the apple blossom and I took a few pictures, I learned that this was a real success story as two earlier, poor and wet seasons had all but killed these bushes. I left Jan to tend to the greenhouse and did my best to capture the new leaves and flowers that were the gardeners' reward for all their hard work over the winter.
Before leaving I paid a quick visit to the greenhouse to say goodbye and add the last few shots, but it was in here that I found myself getting the blindspots that were a precursor to a Migraine and I held out my hand as Jan directed her hose on my outstretched palm to down a couple of Paracetamol tablets. This had blatantly been brought along by my earlier telephone frustrations of the last two days.
That was last week and I did not even look at what I had taken till I had completed the filling of many more boxes to do my best to honour the vow I had broken.
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