Where have all the flowers gone? Long time passing. Where are all the flowers?

HERMIONE was doing her best to cheer up a husband who had all the symptoms of SAD – Seasonally Affected Disorder. She is well used by now to me being Affected, with a habit of spreading Disorder – or at least untidiness - in my wake wherever I go. The problem was with the Seasonal bit.

The condition normally strikes in January or February, brought on by endless dim nights. Yet here was her spouse, long past the equinox, staring with unseeing eyes into the distance, sitting unmoving by the window, looking out over the Rolling Acres. Very SAD indeed.

‘What’s up?’ she asked. ‘Would it help if I made you a nice shepherd’s pie? A nice shepherd’s pie with gravy?’ No answer.

‘Would it help if we went for a brisk walk? The Pooch would love a walk. I’ll fetch his lead.’ No answer.

‘Would it help if I dug out that CD your cousin bought us in Istanbul, put on my yashmak, and did the dance of the seven veils on the kitchen table?’ No answer, though maybe the merest flicker of an eyebrow.

Hermione took my hand gently in hers and spoke softly into my ear: ‘Please, please, tell me what’s wrong.’ I turned my head and met her concerned gaze with mournful eye. After several hesitant false starts, the cause of all the angst spilled out – the weather.

‘I know we have had a few days warmth recently but everything is just so wretchedly behind,’ I burbled. ‘I met a farmer the other day who had only just completed sowing spring corn. It is called ‘spring’ for good reason, yet it did not go into the ground until our alleged, sickly summer was well under way. It may be almost Christmas before that corn is ready for harvesting – if it is ever ready at all.’ Hermione offered no immediate response.

‘I have yet to see any elderflower this year. Have you seen any elderflower, that lovely creamy white elderflower? Maybe I missed it bescause i was sheltering from the rain or maybe there will be no elderflower at all this year? Could it be that this late warmth and lack of growth is the new normal? Could it be that climate change already has us in its deadening grip?’ Hermione nodded and allowed me resume the rant.

‘Have you looked at our vegetable patch? Our early potatoes will be late. Our late potatoes will likely rot in the earth. God be with the days when tomato plants would be looking you in the eye by the end of May. The tomato class of 2018 is a sickly collection of off-colour specimens that do well to look you in the shin. It’s horrendous. Nothing, absolutely, nothing is thriving.’ At this point Hermione ceased her show of sympathetic nodding in favour of some gentle shaking of her pretty head.

She said nothing but took the hand of her distracted spouse, pulled him firmly from his seat, and led him out into the overdue evening sunshine. We walked around the drills of stuttering spuds, past the greenhouse with its tiny tomato plants, along rows of reluctant runner beans. We came at last to a corner of the garden which caught the last of the sun’s benign rays.

‘It’s not true you know, Medders, that nothing is thriving. Look.’ She had led me to the rhubarb patch. And the rhubarb patch was a thing of wondrous beauty, bursting with stalks of impressive length and thickness. Enormous leaves bobbed in the breeze and individual plants appeared to be competing to put on the finest show. Given a dose of horse manure in February ,the rhubarb patch then relished whatever weather was served up and is now producing a record crop.

The merits of rhubarb are cruelly under-estimated – perhaps because it looks a sticky sickly mess – though it is hard to match for flavour. No need to make rhubarb crumble, or rhubarb tart, or rhubarb pie. Better by far to keep it simple by stewing the stalks with a pinch of sugar and serving under copious dollops of plain yoghurt.

Wow! Reasons to be cheerful after all.

‘Tell you what, Hermione. I shall make the shepherd’s pie. You see if you can locate that ‘Belly Dancing for Beginners’ album and we’ll have a right night.’