Freesias
When my father takes a cutting into his magic gardener hands, roots and buds burst out of each end before he’s had a chance to scratch his ear. When he plants it in his garden and pushes the dirt down around it with his green thumb, he has to step back quickly, in case he’s knocked sideways by a flourishing branch.
Sometimes he gives me one of his cultivated cuttings. I plant it, tend it lovingly, protect it from marauding chook beaks and pilfering possums. But I’ve seen it happen, it starts to wilt before I’ve even turned my back to make the call to tell him it’s in the ground. It’s usually dead within the week. Which of course is an exaggeration. Make that a couple of days.
Unlike my father, my thumb is not green. I have his nose, his hair, his eyes, his liking for cockles in brown vinegar and pepper, but not his green thumb.
My favourite spring fragrance is that of the humble freesia. On my walk with the dog this morning my olfactory receptors were wooed by the scent of freesia. I walked the route twice, unable to tear myself away from such sensuous smelling. I was in freesia heaven. Almost every front garden, driveway, border, back porch, front veranda, back fence line and window box we passed was ablaze with the common freesia. So abundant were they, my dog stopped to pee on one. The freesias of the eastern suburbs grow like weeds.
Except in my garden.
I have bought packets of freesia bulbs at nurseries, through mail order catalogues, at school fund-raisers, received them as gifts from friends. One friend secretly planted freesia bulbs in my garden while I was overseas in the hope I’d enjoy freesia-filled festivities come spring. I have donned black pants and hoodie and equipped with bucket and trowel become the Eastern Suburbs Freesia Poacher in the dead of night.
To no avail. My garden is devoid of freesias.
My affection for the freesia began when I was three years old. When my parents emigrated from England to Australia, the first house we lived in was large, old, run-down and had a veranda all the way around it. The garden was wild and rambling and full of freesias.
I particularly remember the freesias.
And I remember the garden being my refuge and friend. It was a place to retreat to, hide in, escape to and imagine in. One of my favourite places to play in was under the canopy of the old weeping birch tree. Its limbs reached the ground and made the perfect tent, dark, mysterious and private. Secret. Mine.
I remember the swing. Though I don’t remember being stuck on it, and the story my mother liked to tell about me going missing. She called and called but I didn’t come. She eventually found my sobbing, legs-aloft, quivering frame swaying forlornly under the tree.
I remember turning the handle of the old gramophone player and cranking up the old 75s, the sound of the far-away scratchy voice that emanated from the horn.
And the sound of the rain on the veranda roof, the smell of the change in the weather after a blazing summers day.
The horse that came to visit at the back gate.
The three women we shared the house with – the old woman and her daughters. Three extra sets of listening ears, three more mothers.
The plum tree. The plum juice dripping down my chin.
And the cutting the women gave my father for me when we left. So she can have her own tree to remember us by.
The scent of freesia. The scent of childhood.
I wish the freesia fairy would visit my garden.
Sometimes he gives me one of his cultivated cuttings. I plant it, tend it lovingly, protect it from marauding chook beaks and pilfering possums. But I’ve seen it happen, it starts to wilt before I’ve even turned my back to make the call to tell him it’s in the ground. It’s usually dead within the week. Which of course is an exaggeration. Make that a couple of days.
Unlike my father, my thumb is not green. I have his nose, his hair, his eyes, his liking for cockles in brown vinegar and pepper, but not his green thumb.
My favourite spring fragrance is that of the humble freesia. On my walk with the dog this morning my olfactory receptors were wooed by the scent of freesia. I walked the route twice, unable to tear myself away from such sensuous smelling. I was in freesia heaven. Almost every front garden, driveway, border, back porch, front veranda, back fence line and window box we passed was ablaze with the common freesia. So abundant were they, my dog stopped to pee on one. The freesias of the eastern suburbs grow like weeds.
Except in my garden.
I have bought packets of freesia bulbs at nurseries, through mail order catalogues, at school fund-raisers, received them as gifts from friends. One friend secretly planted freesia bulbs in my garden while I was overseas in the hope I’d enjoy freesia-filled festivities come spring. I have donned black pants and hoodie and equipped with bucket and trowel become the Eastern Suburbs Freesia Poacher in the dead of night.
To no avail. My garden is devoid of freesias.
My affection for the freesia began when I was three years old. When my parents emigrated from England to Australia, the first house we lived in was large, old, run-down and had a veranda all the way around it. The garden was wild and rambling and full of freesias.
I particularly remember the freesias.
And I remember the garden being my refuge and friend. It was a place to retreat to, hide in, escape to and imagine in. One of my favourite places to play in was under the canopy of the old weeping birch tree. Its limbs reached the ground and made the perfect tent, dark, mysterious and private. Secret. Mine.
I remember the swing. Though I don’t remember being stuck on it, and the story my mother liked to tell about me going missing. She called and called but I didn’t come. She eventually found my sobbing, legs-aloft, quivering frame swaying forlornly under the tree.
I remember turning the handle of the old gramophone player and cranking up the old 75s, the sound of the far-away scratchy voice that emanated from the horn.
And the sound of the rain on the veranda roof, the smell of the change in the weather after a blazing summers day.
The horse that came to visit at the back gate.
The three women we shared the house with – the old woman and her daughters. Three extra sets of listening ears, three more mothers.
The plum tree. The plum juice dripping down my chin.
And the cutting the women gave my father for me when we left. So she can have her own tree to remember us by.
The scent of freesia. The scent of childhood.
I wish the freesia fairy would visit my garden.
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