Rhododendron

Whenever I'm feeling turbulent the one guaranteed thing to calm me down is green. Grass, trees, plants, flowers delicately bursting from the sepal. Living, breathing organisms that speak such a soft and lyrical language that only those with pointed ears can hear.

It's physiological my response to foliage. My heart rate immediately slows, my breathing deeper, my skin alive. And today I needed it.

Bingley and I went to Bunnings to spend obscene amounts of money on boring things to rebuild a wall and a fence, but as ever I wandered into the nursery section to gaze wistfully at the roses. And while there I picked up a cheap punnet of herbs. And then another. And then another. Until my trolley overflowed with scented leaves and delicate blooms. Inhaling lungfuls of orange blossom and lavender. Jasmine and roses. Rosemary and lemon thyme.

I somehow restrained myself from the grandiflora magnolia and the hydrangeas and the stunning liquid amber (having nowhere suitable to plant any). But did bring home 3 variagated varieties of azalea in deep fuschia pinks. And a lot of seedlings and a passionfruit vine.

I spent a happy couple of hours once I came home gently transplanting seedlings into pots and fertilising and mulching the soil. Chatting away to my new plants, gently holding stems of fragile seedlings and apologising for the trauma of uprooting them as I cradled them gently into the hollows in each pot. Laughing at how I must seem - singing to herbs, and stroking petals and leaves as soft as the skin of a trembling bottom lip.

I will be devastated tomorrow if the possums have ravaged my new babies. My experience in this regard has been so traumatic in the past that I brought in my roses tonight and am hoping that the large amounts of dinner that the Possum helpfully left over the floor of the verandah will keep our ravenous invaders away from my tomatoes.

I want to sit in my garden and be surrounded by perfume. To rub mint between my fingers and let the oils stain my skin. To cook with lemon thyme and to make Christmas puddings from my own oranges.