I know how the flowers felt

 The rain to the wind said

‘You push and I’ll pelt!’

They so struck the garden bed

That the flowers actually knelt –

And lay lodged – though not dead.

I know how the flowers felt.

Valerian

Robert Frost (1874 – 1963)    

The garden remains overgrown and the snails are merrily munching everything in sight. Although I’m not fond of them I merely dislodge them and throw them as far as I can, despite knowing that they stoically turn around and methodically glide back from whence they came.

Rabbits have eaten all the beans and peas on the allotment but as the flowers of the broad bean are said to induce madness and bad dreams perhaps that is no bad thing. 

Yet more snails have chomped their way through my carefully-nurtured sunflowers. I hope to have rescued three - out of a whole seed tray - which is such a pity as each year my huge sunflowers have waved cheerfully to all and sundry as they leaned over the allotment fence. 

White wisteria flowers at last!

I have managed to plant out most of the new perennials for the border, despite the huge deluge on Sunday afternoon that thoroughly soaked both Pablo and me. 

Only fit for entering a wet t-shirt competition, I consoled myself by remembering that my grandmother always maintained that ‘rain was good for the complexion’. She always rinsed her hair in rain water too. Grandma Lee wore her hair in a small, flat bun, held in place under a fine hairnet and I recollect how amazed I was the first time I saw her wash her hair – in a bowl on the table – to see that it reached almost to her waist. 

Proof that rain doesn’t only make plants grow!