The Only Polytunnel in the Village

08/05/2007 by admin.

This week, I have been finding out what buddhists are like when they’re annoyed.* The occasion to find this out was my first ever visit to Wales, which was made in true destroy-the-environment-to-save-it style as mentioned by Kitchenwitch. Come to think of it, Wales is the furthest I’ve been from home in quite a long time, being as it usually takes the promise of some rare seeds just to get me out of the garden these days. This time, however, it was a jaunt to help my old friend Digiveg put up his spanking new polytunnel.

Golygfa Hyfryd: “Beautiful View”

Digiveg and his wife Chickenlady recently used the Black Arts in order to fund their escape to Wales. Digi denies this, of course, explaining that keeping his old house on with tenants in it to pay the mortgage is nothing shady - a sort of reverse buy-to-let. I don’t know, sounds suspiciously like Accountancy to me. However he did it, the Digis decamped with indecent haste last autumn and are now quietly developing a two-acre smallholding in southwest Wales. Walking the Walk, in other words. So far vast areas of grass have been reclaimed for vegetables, whole flocks of battery chickens have been re-homed and the first of several lines of willow plantings have been, er, planted. Most telling of all a row of leylandii has been sacrificed to the Great God of Self-Sufficiency, which makes Digiveg an official Good Sort in my book.

A polytunnel goes up with slightly less fuss than an Amish barn-raising, and there’s no requirement to have either a beard or a bad attitude (although by the end of it Digiveg had both). There’s quite a bit of work and head-scratching involved though, so it was important that we got as much time as possible to put the thing up. Naturally, this meant that the world conspired against us. Unexpected visitors, children with tonsillitis, diary clashes, poorly grandparents; you name it, it was all thrown into the mix. It was with mingled fatigue and relief that we finally rolled onto Digi’s driveway, only to find that a horrific nail-clipping accident had forced Digi and ChickenLady to make a mercy dash to the duty vet in Pen Y Bun, and they wouldn’t be back for a while. Oh, and the frame wasn’t up, which was grounds for saying “Ah.”

From the beginning we knew we were up against it, and before long we were doing what Hedgewizards do; working on until it was too dark to see. We finally got the cover on the following day, a mere hour after Witchypoo and I were supposed to have left. There was a modicum of tension, and not just in the polythene film. By that time I’d had my bum in the holly hedge more times than I care to think about, Digiveg (normally the most laid back person on the planet) had been reduced to making Executive Decisions with more than a Whiff of Miff, and Witchypoo was brassed off by the whole thing. Chickenlady was… well… more buddhist than ever, dispensing sweetness and calm as a sort of spiritual counterweight to all the tetch going down in the garden. But the tunnel… was up!

Of polytunnels themselves, more another time. But if you’re contemplating a purchase just now, let me offer you a piece of advice; count all the bits when they arrive, read the instructions cover to cover at least twice, and have the frame up before your helpers arrive!

*It turns out they’re just as snippy as anyone else, but they apologize more for it afterwards.

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