The crocus of hope and the snowdrop of fear

 There is a little patch in my garden, under the beech hedge that we often neglect. For some reason it’s a place where the Long Suffering Husband will leave a random wooden structure, built for some long forgotten purpose. It’s the area of the garden that the dog likes to have a poo, if we haven’t taken him out soon enough. In preference, he would much rather go right next to the dog poo bin but sometimes his servants don’t take him out soon enough. It’s an area that doesn’t get much light and the grass underneath always looked a bit sorry for itself. I had tried planting things around the base of the hedge. Bluebells, snowdrops, Lily of the Valley, cyclamen had all been pretty unsuccessful but I wanted to make the area look a bit nicer.

Last year, Monty suggested that everyone could have a small patch of flower meadow, which seemed like it would be worth a try in my useless area. I sowed some yellow rattle seed (to make the grass less invasive) chucked in some wild meadow flowers and pushed in some naturalising crocus bulbs. I have instructed the LSH not to mow that section.

Yesterday. I noticed that the crocuses have started to appear. Boris was right, there is a crocus of hope. I started to get excited and began to imagine a beautiful (but small) meadowland buzzing with life and pretty flowers in the area formally known as dog shit corridor.  A pair of blue tits also moved into the nest box and I, again, got overly excited about my new neighbours, the company I would have and the time I would be able to waste watching their children grow. 

I’ve done the thing that we all did with Boris’ crocus of hope. I imagined too far ahead. After the announcement of the roadmap out of lockdown a lot of people relaxed and imagined a brighter future. Teenagers went back to planning their lives “after Corona,” Old folks threw caution to the half vaccinated wind and threw a dinner party and the food factories of the Midlands continued to spread the virus in uncontrolled ways because no one had thought to look outside London. 

In the dog shit corridor, not only is there a crocus of hope but there’s also a snowdrop of fear. I noticed that a single snowdrop (of the hundreds I had planted) has grown. There was supposed to be a carpet of white under the hedge but nature had other ideas. What if the crocus of hope ends up like that? One single snowdrop to remind you of your failure!

It’s been a difficult week to be phoning homeschooling parents. The crocus of hope and snowdrop of fear have been equally present and I am quite full of other people’s emotions.

Last night, JVT and Hat Mancock gave a briefing. They appeared terrified. In some areas (even though we are still in lockdown) cases are rising again. Obviously, they couldn’t possibly say that they’ve gone too early. They couldn’t confess to getting too excited about the crocus of hope. So, it’s our fault. We’ve taken our foot off the brake. We’ve scored 3 goals but if we relax in the last 5 minutes then the other team still have time to score 4. The snowdrop of fear is very much alive. Maybe the conditions just weren’t right, after all.