Ciao dearest Friends in the Hive Garden!

It has been an age since I last posted here, having been a regular contributor for some years... Things have been strange and difficult and fabulous and consuming in all the small and large pieces of land that I've been working on/ gardening in. It has been a good while since I had something succinct to talk about in terms of a specific project and update! Sergio's garden has some complex dynamics, the wilder parts of the 'orti' below the Via Dietro Gli Orti are greener than they've ever been, and my front mini-street-garden is thriving with flowers and a new bamboo structure: with everything else that has been so dynamically changing in life (like my Art. career to a reconstructing clothing one!), it has not been easy to anchor something to share.

the steepwalk down to this garden...

Bot now here I have some photos from Rosemary Cottage in Guardia Sanframondi - just down from my magical Arthouse in the medieval quarter. Because of us helping my Scottish 'occasional neighbour' with an immense crop of lemons this year(tons!), he passed on the word that I am a competent gardener to a Canadian who has a beautiful homestead down below the town. Funny, because when he proposed that I could do some paid garden work, I had a few days earlier been down pilfering his grapefruit already - Natural Law helping out with removing what would otherwise become a fly-and-rat-fest! He gave me permission to go down and more thoroughly assess the place, with a view to bringing it back into order and harmony.
 

It has been left for around 6 years I think; someone is still working on the grape vines and olive grove part, but the front and back gardens were quite profoundly neglected. Ivy was growing up the front of the house and many of the beautiful fruit trees were overwhelmed too - as well as being very bushy and sprackely. The drive was very heavily weedy and run-off soil had gathered in various edges...

I'm pottering merrily around at bases of trees and in the tops of them, clearing ivy and bringing light and air into their centres. Piling up lumps of turf to prepare what may evolve into flower beds, and making space in the shadier parts to allow woodland flowers to thrive. Trimming the giant rosemary bushes and the suckered fruit trees. And generally trying to give the whole garden the best outlook in the most efficient time possible. The mature ivy along the house may require stronger tools and a higher ladder.

So far I have done couple of hours of surveying and 5 hours of clearing. And some ongoing foraging, which is par for the course here when stranieri (foreigners) leave there gardens for excessive periods! I actually found a tartufo estivo (summer truffle!) here last month! And tons of asparagus. The bizarre weather patterns have brought out a few surprises in this verdant paradise. I have access to pine cones and fallen branches for firewood.

What I love so much about this job, is that I get to spend a lot of time in this garden. Very different from scampering in and out illicitely! I get to really explore and to feel my way intuitively into the place. It is super peaceful, with mostly only birdsong and the wind in the trees - if a dog barks far away or a car shushes by, this doesn't intrude at all. Because of the very steep incline into the property, it feels secluded and private: truly a place to be at one with Nature and to get out of structural or combattive thinking.

It is a joy to have been commissioned to do this work - on my terms. I explained to the owner that I work slowly and symbiotically - when actually I have achieved a lot already relatively quickly. Perhaps it is best to put a caveat like that into a work agreement, so that any quicker results will be an extra welcomed boon, hehe!

I agreed to be paid partly in fruit during the appropriate seasons: he has grapefuit, oranges, lemons, figs, persimmons, loquats, olives. The couple wish to sell the cottage, so really want to bring it into a state of beauty for presenting (rather than the current and rather unseductive state it is in) - and have already suggested that they might be tempted to keep it, from my lush updates... I am in my element, and it is really something I look forward to rather than thinking 'euch, now I need to go to my job'. I like very much that it is just the right distance on foot from my house, and that it feels a lot further away. I like that I have permission to enter it and to work intuitively. I love that I am being paid, when I have so little fiat currency each month - and that I will get this payment cash-in-hand, which is even better and more convenient. My rapport with the owner is easy, as he is very pleased with my work and the progress already. It is a win-win-win situation.

So that almost concludes my garden report for this month of May, where we've just had an epic lighting and hail storm... a very dramatic night. This late spring follows a very mild - first super dry, then super wet - winter, where many delicate plants have not died back like usual. It also follows a very harsh previous year for fruits: the olives and wine grapes on which the economy of the Sannio valley depend, were decimated last year by multiple, eratic weather conditions - and the prices of wine and olive oil (and their scarcity) are being felt already. The agrumi (citrus trees), olives and other fruits are showing high numbers of blossoms - our Via is rich with the intoxicating perfume of orange blooms! - so barring another dramatic weather year with heavy hail/ eratic temperatures/ high winds/ drought, it is boding well so far for fruit.

I wish you all good things tante belle cose with your gardening and working your working with the earth... It is a great pleasure to be sharing with you again - thanks to new technology, following my recent off-grid and smashing-my-phone adventures!

the garden I'm working is just to the right of this photo, but hidden behind trees

Blessings!

Clare. Gaia Sophia

www.claregaiasophia.com