Getting The Garden Spring/Summer Ready.

There comes a moment every year usually around the first day the sun appears and we British people immediately declare it “BBQ weather” when you look out at your garden and realise it resembles a post‑apocalyptic wasteland where civilisation collapsed sometime around October. 

There are leaves everywhere, the patio furniture has developed a personality, and something in the corner is either a shrub or a creature that has achieved sentience.

This is when you decide, with the optimism of a person who has clearly forgotten last year, that you will “get the garden Spring/Summer ready”.

This is a phrase that sounds simple, like “boil an egg” or “assemble flat‑pack furniture”, but is actually a multi‑stage psychological journey involving denial, rage, and several trips to the garden centre where you spend £87 on items you don’t understand.

The first step is Assessing the Situation, which is where you stand in the garden, hands on hips, nodding like you’re on a home‑improvement show. You say things like “Shouldn’t take long” and “Bit of a tidy-up”. This is delusional. Your garden knows it. The birds know it. Even the neighbour’s cat, who is judging you from the fence, knows it.

Next comes The Raking Phase, which is where you attempt to gather all the leaves into a neat pile. This is impossible. Leaves do not obey physics. You rake them into a pile, turn around, and they immediately scatter like they’re fleeing a crime scene. After 20 minutes you have created not one pile, but 17 smaller piles and a deep sense of personal failure.

Then you move on to The Weeding, which is the part where you discover that weeds are nature’s Terminators. You pull one out and three more appear, possibly laughing. Some weeds have roots that go all the way to Australia. Others are so deeply embedded that archaeologists will one day find them and assume they were part of a ritual.

At this point you decide to mow the lawn, which has grown to the height of a small pony. You wheel out the lawnmower, which has been in the shed all winter and now behaves like a Victorian child with consumption. You pull the cord. Nothing happens. You pull it again. Still nothing. By the seventh attempt you are threatening it with violence, and by the tenth you are Googling “Is it legal to set fire to a lawn”.

Eventually the mower coughs into life, emitting a noise that suggests it is powered by pure resentment. You begin mowing, only to discover that your lawn is not flat. It contains bumps, dips, holes, and at least one mysterious mound that may be a portal to another dimension. The mower hits a stick, makes a noise like a dying robot, and sprays grass clippings directly into your face.

Now comes The Garden Centre Trip, which is mandatory. You go in for one bag of compost and leave with:  

– Three bags of compost  

– A plant you’ve never heard of  

– A trowel that looks exactly like the one you already own  

– A solar‑powered garden ornament shaped like a hedgehog wearing sunglasses  

– A sense of financial regret

Back home, you begin The Planting, which is where you dig holes, place plants in them, and then immediately forget what any of them are. You water everything enthusiastically, including one object that later turns out to be a rock.

Finally, after hours of labour, you step back and admire your work. The garden looks… slightly less terrible. Not good. Not “Instagrammable”. But no longer like the set of a documentary about urban decay.

You sit down on the patio furniture, which collapses because you forgot it rusted over winter.

And that’s when you realise: getting the garden Spring/Summer ready is not a task. It is a lifestyle. A battle. A seasonal tradition in which you attempt to impose order on nature, and nature laughs in your face.

But you’ll do it again next year.

Because hope springs eternal.

And so do the weeds.