Why a wood is the root of all happiness

Tired, stressed and sick of sitting at a desk, Ruth Pavey bought some scrubland, planted trees — and found utter bliss

AFRIEND once bought a patch of rough woodland near Bath. It had no obvious use to him, but (as he told me) a man likes to own a piece of nature.

And that’s exactly what gardening writer ruth Pavey decided. At the end of the last decade, desk-bound in London, she felt ‘ the quickening of an old, recurrent wish: to plant trees’.

Born in Somerset, she was drawn back to her roots in that beautiful county and felt she was following a family tradition ‘to cultivate and make a mark’ on the land.

There is no act more satisfying than planting trees, knowing that (all being well) they will outlive you.

But in order to do this wherever you like, you need to own the land — and let nobody imagine that the process is easy.

Pavey’s dreams swiftly careered into a roadblock of reality with the actual purchase. Captivated by the beauty of the boggy, mysterious, big- skyed Somerset Levels, she set her heart on three appealing fields, only to see them sell for £19,500 at auction.

So she had to settle for four acres of overgrown scrubland near a road — a snip at £ 2,750 — and surveyed her consolation prize in murky rain, aware that this project would not be easy.

her struggles with nettles, brambles, heavy, soggy clay and intruders (fourlegged and two- legged) form the backbone of this utterly delightful memoir — which will also serve as an inspiring manual for anybody who wants to clear and cultivate. F OR a start, your favourite pair of secateurs won’t cut it — literally. Pavey soon realises she has to overcome her reluctance to hire men with machinery, otherwise the neglected orchard and woodland will defeat her. She also understands the importance of getting on with the neighbours, finding out who will help you, who may be a nuisance, and so on.

her anecdotes and character sketches are beguiling — especially when she visits the previous owners of the land, now in a nursing home. Of course, they fail to answer her questions.

One step forward, two steps back is the rhythm of this touching quest to discover and create the spirit of a place.

A key question has cropped up more than once during the 18 years Pavey has spent — with great patience in the face of setbacks — creating her precious wood.

One day, she was proudly showing someone the work-in-progress, but as they struggled through shoulder-high weeds, the friend asked impatiently: ‘What is all this for?’

Pavey’s first — and obvious — answer was ‘that I had taken up this quixotic pursuit because I wanted to. The wood, a beautiful, unmanageable place, had already become so much a part of me that it seemed to need no explanation’.

But there’s more to it than that: the story of how Pavey buys a scruffy roll along (or building site cabin) in order to have a chilly, secure base within the wood, then later caves in and buys a run-down cottage in nearby Langport; her meetings with wildlife and joyous attempts to entertain friends at woodland parties; her stoical response to newly planted trees dying; and the painful realisation that the countryside is always under threat.

All this creates a narrative of warmth, honesty and great spirit — made all the

more beautiful by Pavey’s own lively and accomplished drawings.

You become so involved with her project that you share her wry amusement when friends ask: ‘When will your wood be finished?’ For a wood, like a garden, is never finished.

But though the hard work continues, so do the rewards, growing in richness each year. The friend who first asked that key, searching question later admitted: ‘I couldn’t see it before, but I get it now.’

Looking for a word to describe what she finds within her wood, the author decides on ‘solace’. Her explanation is simple: ‘Some find consolation in religion or meditation, but I prefer to be out of doors, quietly busy.’

Pavey’s love for her small patch of land shimmers off the page. She writes: ‘I am not sure why we humans should take comfort from the natural world, harsh and implacable as it is, but there is something very buoyant about the company of trees, plants, animals, birds, insects, all intent upon their own lives.

‘As far as we know, they just get on with it, having offspring, trying not to starve, not to be eaten, without asking why. Perhaps some of this buoyancy transmits itself, helps keep us afloat, too.’

The wood, she says, simply makes her ‘happy just to be there’. It has taught her to accept problems will happen, but that if you work very hard, they may be overcome.

It has given her gifts beyond measure. And this lovely book is itself a gift — encouraging country-dweller and townie alike to marvel at the infinite possibilities at the heart of a single tree.