An empty garden, an extraordinary number of tomatoes and fifteen months’ work I’ll always be proud of.
When I arrived, it was an empty space. Looking back at the photographs now, it’s almost difficult to reconcile that beginning with what came later: beds full of vegetables, flowers spilling over their edges, a polytunnel and glasshouse laden with tomatoes and somewhere lovely to sit amongst it all.
I did all the work in that garden. The growing, the planting, the tending and the gradual business of turning an empty space into something productive and beautiful. And when I look at it now, the feeling that comes first is absolute pride.
Not because everything went wonderfully. It didn’t. But what I created there was wonderful, and the way things ended hasn’t changed that.
Somewhere to stay, something to grow
Last year, I went to live and work on a farm and nursery. The arrangement was that I would work twenty hours a week without pay in exchange for somewhere to stay and food. At that point in our lives, having somewhere to put the caravan and an opportunity to do work I enjoyed meant a great deal.
The reality became very different from the agreement. Twenty hours turned into forty-plus, sometimes more than seventy, and my responsibilities spread well beyond the garden. I ended up doing a bit of practically everything across the farm.
There are difficult parts of that experience, including how I was treated, which I’m not going to pretend away. But there is another truth alongside them: I absolutely loved my work.
I loved having things to grow and a space to create. I loved seeing the results of what I did, watching seedlings develop and finding myself surrounded by something that had begun with an idea and a considerable amount of effort. It helped me get my confidence back. As the garden took shape, I was beginning to rebuild myself too.
Flowers, food and possibly enough tomatoes
I’ve always loved colour and beauty in a garden. I like different areas to have their own colour schemes, and I put thought into how things will look together. That doesn’t mean I want everything clipped into submission. I love abundance: flowers, foliage and plants making themselves thoroughly at home.
Growing food is part of that pleasure. There’s something enormously satisfying about tending something you’ll eventually bring into the kitchen, and last year I grew a huge amount of tomatoes of several different varieties. I had cucumbers coming out of my ears, squash, pumpkins, fennel, potatoes, soft fruits, chillies, grapes, even nectarines, to name a few.
The photographs tell that story better than any sensible estimate could. There’s the polytunnel and glasshouse early on, with young plants and plenty of space between them, and then there’s the same space later, full of growth, with tomatoes hanging in great clusters. Apparently, I’d taken the business of growing a few things quite seriously.
Outside, the garden gradually became somewhere I wanted to spend time as well as work. Flowers filled the beds near the caravan, pots gathered around the seating area and the growing space stretched out towards the polytunnel. There was room for useful things and beautiful things, often together.
One of my favourite views was through the caravan door. I could look out at what I’d created and enjoy it as part of my everyday surroundings. It wasn’t only something to photograph once it was finished. It was there while life carried on: plants growing, flowers opening and another job inevitably waiting.
Growing a little confidence
When you’ve lost a great deal, it can take time to feel confident in yourself again. You still have your knowledge, your experience and your ability to work, but circumstances can knock the stuffing out of you.
Having work I loved helped. There were things I knew how to do, things I could make happen and results I could see in front of me. I was creating something, and I was good at it.
Beyond the farm, I met some wonderful people around the town. Some became friends I expect to have for life. I also found additional paid gardening work elsewhere, which brought other opportunities into my days.
Those are important parts of the story. The people who welcomed me, the friendships that grew and the pleasure of doing work I enjoyed all belong to those fifteen months just as much as the difficulties do. I have very fond memories, and I’m not prepared to let a bad ending rewrite them.
Still standing
The treatment I experienced there wasn’t an isolated experience during this part of my life. There had been a pattern of being underestimated, taken advantage of or bullied when I was already dealing with difficult circumstances.
At times, it felt as though losing my home and finding myself at rock bottom had led people to assume I was weak or powerless. I wasn’t. I was living through something difficult, which is a different thing altogether.
I sometimes felt there was an expectation that I should be permanently miserable about it: downhearted, defeated and waiting for somebody else to decide what happened next. Instead, I was getting on with life, making our surroundings as beautiful as I could and finding things to enjoy. That didn’t mean I’d forgotten what had happened or stopped wanting a better situation. It meant I still wanted to live.
This time, when I was being bullied and knew I’d done nothing wrong, I stood my ground. I wasn’t prepared to lie back and take it.
I stayed loyal to my work and the farm even when I had other options, because the job mattered to me. But caring about the work didn’t mean I had to accept everything that came with it. I’m proud that I held on to both things: my commitment to what I was doing and my right to stand up for myself.
The video I made follows the transformation from my arrival through to mid-July. Watching that progression, knowing the work that went into it, gives me an enormous sense of satisfaction.
Mine to be proud of
It didn’t end well. I can say that without regretting the whole experience, because I don’t regret it for a second.
I grew things, created things, met people I’m glad to know and began to feel more confident about what I could do next. There were difficult days, but there was also an enormous amount of pleasure in the work itself.
When I look at those photographs, I see the empty space becoming a garden. I see the flowers, the vegetables, the tomatoes and all those hours of work taking shape. I remember how much I loved doing it.
Whatever happened afterwards, nobody can take that away from me. Look what I grew.
