Visiting inspiration...
Have been thinking about the inspiration that nice garden visitors can give me. Like the friend who whooshed around and commented 'It's amazing that you have so few weeds. How do you keep them all down?' Bit of an exaggeration, but a lovely thing to say when I'd actually been working hard weeding. I felt really proud of my efforts!
No room for Weeds!
Then there's the opposite type : like another visitor who wandered past the garden gnomes and didn't even crack a smile. 'There are sixty-seven of them. They all have names'I offered. No reaction. This visitor was heavily into growing edibles, but surely she could have found time for a gentle gnomish comment. Garden gnomes were beneath her?
Doing an inventory...
Some visitors seem only interested in labels, as if they're doing an inventory of all my plants and trees. I guess this is OK. It does inspire me to be more accurate, to keep labels, spell things correctly, and so on. Ligularias or Farfugiums? The orange daisy flowers are still just as pretty. Montbretia or Crocosmias? I don't care (nor do they) - as long as they're not called Watsonias.
Ligularias
There's always the plant identification Ap, if the gardener (me) can't remember or doesn't know. Have never used it, but I had one visitor who helpfully poked her phone into my shrubs, then came up with some ridiculous North American identifications. I guess I could use it on that strange tree which I thought was a type of Dogwood. My latest visitors weren't so sure...
Cornus Siberia? Or a Viburnum?
But visitors need to be sensitive in their use of vocabulary. I don't know what's more deflating - someone gushing about the wonderful wilderness feel (I'd prefer something about the clever contrast between the wild and the tamed), or someone who only says 'Thank you for showing me around your garden'. Adding just one adjective would make me feel it had been worthwhile. I'd even settle for 'quirky'.
Welcome back!
But hey! My friend who praised my weeding skills is welcome to come back anytime...