The forsythia is blooming so it’s time to prune the roses and plant some new ones. Of course, the forsythia starting blooming just as a whole wad of snow fell so I’m not entirely confident I can use this old gardener’s rule this year. Never mind, I’m hauling out the compost, the loppers, the shovels and the bonemeal and hoping for the best!
Hello Dahlia!

Dahlias, darling
Spring
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James |
I am in a state of longing. Spring is such a near thing and yet, this morning, the little pot of ivy I left out is rimmed in frost. Frost! I rub salt into my homesick wound by checking the London weather on my computer dashboard: 75 all week. I squeeze lemon into my emotional paper cut by watching the Kings Road web cam obsessively. I can see the school children in their woolly jumpers and tidy lines serpentine along the footpath on their way between playing fields and classrooms. For a moment I am sure I see my own in that line. Perhaps it’s because my photographs of that time are so blurry?
These Foolish Things
When I first came to London there were things I believed the English did better than anyone else. I still do, even the irritating customs. Some of these habits are long-standing: driving on the left (that’s from reigns in the left hand, lance in the right), others are newer: the English proclivity for queuing left over from the war. Most are almost holdovers from the days of Empire. The English can make noblesse oblige look as natural as breathing.