How did we manage it??!!!!
Well, this is a mostly true story, so here goes:
I was running a local authority psychiatric hostel in London. And there was this guy working for me.
Fancied himself a bit……
But, really, can you blame me???
And to cut a long, chaotic story short, I fancied him and thought I’d have a quick fling with him. A couple of weeks, I thought, and he was due to leave shortly to take his qualification. So, in what was supposed to be a supervision session, I had a (successful!) go at seducing him. 
But then, I looked a bit different then, even if I was (am) older than him.
His best friend was so shocked that he took me out to lunch to lecture me about how it Was Not On. And, indeed, I’d probably be arrested today.
Reader, you will have guessed, that two week fling became the rest of our (so far) lives.
The end of My Brilliant Career.
Charles moved in with me, into the upstairs of my large Victorian terrace house. Why the upstairs? Well, I had recently split up with someone and had found having my own space and independence rather delightful and I wasn’t about to give that up. Nor was I going to have his collection of pottery in my newly liberated kitchen.
Charles collected stuff like this
My china. No way those could live together, even if we could.
You know, I feel shocked now, at our comparative affluence compared to how many or most people of that kind of age are living now. It’s shocking. Though it was a struggle in many ways. (That house was full of dry rot.)
And then I became ill, which was the end of that job and my career.
Leaving London
I needed to sell that house and get a cheaper one, preferably without dry rot. And by now you will be wondering where on earth gardens come into it.
Well, I had got the garden bug by then and had made a garden which, astonishingly, had made it into the National Gardens Scheme.
Err.. you can tell Charles was going to become a garden photographer…
But was always helpful
Somehow I enthused him and we spent much time on his motorbike visiting famous gardens.
Yes, we did the lot.
And out of what felt to be the ruins of my life, I turned to an ambition to make another garden.
One which would be for life, which, given my fantasies, a London backyard could not be. Charles did not want to leave London, but, in something of a sulk, decided to come with me.
Mind you – I did look like this. Would you believe that I truly did not believe I was at all attractive? (Note – I don’t look a bit like this now)
We tried the Peak District because Charles had friends nearby. Then, just when I was about to exchange contracts on the London house, Charles discovered that we wouldn’t be allowed permission to convert farmland to garden, – which we needed if we were to realise my amazingly ambitious garden plans. Well, Charles had been at university (it was the full deal then – harder to get into and with its full title = university) in Bristol and knew the Wye Valley.
He drew a desperate outline on our road atlas. We booked a weekend in a pub in St Briavels. I booked appointments to view whatever houses were on the market that weekend. And we set off to Wales.
Spot Devauden
Making Veddw Garden – a love story originally appeared on GardenRant on February 13, 2025.
The post Making Veddw Garden – a love story appeared first on GardenRant.
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