In praise of... my overgrown fatsia

I smiled when I saw this Sunday's Gospel, in which a landowner, faced with weeds among his wheat, tells his servants Let both grow together until the harvest... (Matthew 13: 30). When I moved to my new home last September, I decided to give everything in the garden - unless it was bindweed or an obvious bramble  - a year in which to show me its potential, before I made any decisions about changes, or drastic cutting back. And thus far, I have stuck to this; the one exception being when I cut away several stems on a shrub which had been blocking the light from a struggling, too-close peony.

Although, my resolve did wobble in the spring. A corner of the garden is completely dominated by an immense fatsia japonica which, by spring, seemed to be contributing nothing except hundreds of dead berries and dozens of dead leaves for me to regularly clear up. What few plants were growing beneath or near its increasingly looming shadow were either somehow surviving in semi-darkness, or had elongated stems, snaking their way towards at least some sunlight. As I swept up its berries - yet again! - I would wonder how drastically it could be chopped back, and how this corner could then be transformed.

But what with busyness and other things, I left the fatsia alone, apart from some minor pruning and regular eye-rolls - especially whenever I swept up those berries! And then, when I treated myself to a solar-powered hanging light feature for the garden, and in the absence of any convenient hooks, the fatsia graciously presented itself as the perfect hanger. As soon as twilight has fallen the lights now twinkle at me through the gently wafting leaves. As the evenings grew warmer I moved a chair underneath it, and began sitting there in the velvety late dusk darkness, half-bathed in the light, to pray and reflect on the day. 

And then came the first of this summer's heatwaves... 

... And the fatsia immediately transformed itself into an all-day canopy, casting its kindly, cooling shadow over the entire corner - including the chairs I can leave out there, with no worries about the seats becoming burning hot. On less sweltering, between-heatwave days I have eaten lunch out there: ten or twelve steps in the scorching midday sun, and then... aahhh! my little shady corner!

In my last blog I wrote how grateful I have been for the protection and the balm of shady, sheltered corners and cool, leafy canopies - as much as for air conditioned interiors! And how grateful, too, for whatever it was prevented me from a prematurely drastic cutting back of the fatsia! By day and by night, its overgrown state has been serving me well, catching and holding the sun for hours in its huge, overhanging leaves - no longer a nuisance, but a blessed haven! And so, I will let it grow until its own 'harvest time'... and then, when I do prune and cut back, I will do so very mindful of the need to maintain and strengthen its likely to be increasingly necessary summertime heatwave service.