Leaving with the leaves

Dear Monty,



I have decided that it is probably about the right time to sign off from writing letters to you. As the light fades and the leaves leave the trees and the brief period of dormancy begins.

Saying goodbye to you is easier when it is in tandem with the season. I end my letters to you not in a melancholy way but as a celebration of light - the light both natural and existential. I have come on a journey these past few years and writing to you about the garden has helped me enormously.

I identified with your struggles and your connection to the soil - the sheer effort involved in making a garden can be vitally restorative on many levels - both physically and certainly mentally as you and many others have proved.

I remember my first letter to you being very tongue in cheek - mocking your pretentiousness in calling a section of your garden 'the jewel garden' not realising at the time the connection both you and Sarah had to the fashion industry and the craft of jewel making. It is that sense of connection - the personalisation of a garden space that now motivates me the most.

I have enjoyed writing these letters to you - you have been my foil - a name to hang my rambling on. I know you read at least one of them and I thank you for the fact that you took time to write a response on Twitter.

I will continue to write about the garden, life and art but my letters will be addressed to anyone who so wishes to read and respond to them.
So thank you Monty for being my 'muse' - I leave you with this observation from today :



I am sitting on the new bench looking back at the Band Hall and up to the wooded hill from where the owls come. The garden now has a kind of dance within it - a ballet - of trees and shrubs and beds. Each has a dancing relationship to the other - they twirl and swirl and sing to each other in the fiery late autumn light.
 Punctuation - something that I have never been good at on the page - appears to be working in this theatrical space - like musical notes on manuscript.

Paul.

Comments

  1. I too am looking forward to a new bench. Mine will go under the lemon tree.

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    1. How wonderful it must be to be able to sit under a lemon tree x

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  2. I’ve always loved your letters to Monty so I’m sad this is the last one. Pleased you’re keeping writing.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you Alison - I suppose I used Monty as a tag but I just want to see if I can write without him - if you see what I mean - it will be interesting !

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  3. I recognise that bench I think - really good one. And HURRAY! off on your own now - well, alone apart from all the rest of us who follow and support you and enjoy you and who are not celeby. XXXX

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  4. Wow I didn't know I was enjoyed ! That makes me very happy. Come on Anne I've seen you on TV you are a bit celeby ! X

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  5. I have no doubt that you will be able to continue to write. And we will continue to be touched by your communications.

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    Replies
    1. I'm touched that you have been touched Charles x

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