Should We Retreat From My Retreat?

Photos Copyright: Maggie May

This is one of the little nooks where I sit while reading a book on a sunny day. Sometimes I just sit and survey the garden and plan out in my head what I'm going to do with it. Not long ago, I couldn't have bothered with this as I felt so ill, so this renewed interest and vigour is definitely a step in the right direction, don't you think?

A few days ago, I was sitting on this bench reading a book. It was a really warm day and everything seemed good. Suddenly branches started falling all over me. My next door neighbour had started chopping again and although she had a perfect right to cut branches off my tall shrub that were overhanging her garden, I did think that it was a bit anti social to choose a time when I was actually sitting there. She muttered to me, "It is within the law." So I said,"Thats OK." and left it at that. I decided to stay seated and carried on reading my book, even though there were bits and pieces falling down on me. I just trusted that she wouldn't actually cut a large branch down that would bang my head. Eventually, Sam, my son, came out with a cup of tea and sat down beside me. He rolled his eyes when he saw what was happening. We have had this kind of thing happen spasmodically, over the past few years. These spells usually go on for a good few weeks and wreck our lives for a while.

Because of these occasional problems that we have with this neighbour, we have put up bamboo screening on trellis so that we might be more private as well as providing more shelter for my shrubs in case the cold had a bad effect on them.

I am slightly suspicious now that my trees that died might have had a helping hand. I was sure it was because of a cold snap that those trees died, however because the neighbour cornered Harry on the same day that she was in a chopping frenzy and asked him to climb up and chop the overhanging branches off, I now think theres more to it than meets the eye. Although Harry is physically much better now this new cancer drug is working, it would be very silly for him to go up ladders with loppers. I am pleased that he told her he couldn't do this because of ill health. She then snapped that Sam should do it.

This neighbour doesn't like to have much in her garden and has one tree and a stretch of lawn. She has asked me before if she could cut the heads off any flowers that popped over her side.

This reminded me of the Addams Family, when Morticia chopped the heads off flowers and just left the stalks and leaves in the vase, sighing with satisfaction and saying, "Ah....... that's better."

Does anyone remember the Addams Family?

We are lying low....... but I don't think we have heard the end of her annoyance and wait with bated breath wondering if she will react in some awful way.

You can see the tamarisk tree stump that died. I have left the trunk in so that the Clematis will not be disturbed and it is now budding and will hopefully cover up the eye sore.

The fencing is not that high but might prevent anything being thrown over the wall.

I decided to plant my potted bay tree in the devastated bare patch and hope it will spring to life quickly and not take years to grow.

I have been very guarded about what I write on my blog over the years, but as it is a kind of journal about real life events, I decided that this attitude is silly because I found myself in a situation where I couldn't write about anything in case it might be taken the wrong way.

So this is one of our trials at the moment and naturally, I wanted to write about it.