I know people move their homes because they have to.
For their work, for their partner, to downsize, to be closer to friends or relatives, maybe for a change. And many people don’t mind this much or positively embrace it. They may think of themselves like Socrates did, as “not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world.”
The idea of moving is intolerable to me.
Though strangely I don’t feel a hundred percent at home in my home.
I am English, born and raised in England, and yet here I am, four miles over the border in Wales. And I don’t know anyone who would find this troubling apart from me. It’s fine in the UK to embrace patriotism if you’re Irish, Welsh or Scot, but not if you’re English. Even then, I think feeling displaced because you’re in the wrong country is possibly unusual. (Though oddly, this post gave rise to a discussion with a friend and a discovery that she is heading back to Scotland from England shortly for that very sort of reason).
We’ve made a garden here. And it’s true, that would be truly awful, leaving the garden. It feels strange to me that it’s a Welsh garden, and in many ways that costs us. We may be only four miles from the border but books about English Gardens are unlikely to include us. Garden tours usually have to be specifically visiting Wales to include us, but rather bizarrely this means that often people will make huge journeys – south to north is especially problematic – to be being in Wales.
There isn’t even a decent road north to south. (Spot the border..) From where we are, near Chepstow, it’s about an hour and a half to Hidcote Garden in England, and four hours to Bodnant Garden in Wales.
But there’s no way I am going to move, even to be back in England. I am just the peculiar kind of person who is totally committed to a place, every inch of it, house and garden. Both are rather ‘home made’, meaning we have done most of whatever has been done, in and out, ourselves – I made my kitchen as well as the garden.
Home made and rather random….
Part of my engagement with the place is my consciousness of its history. Exploring the history has been one way that has helped me come to terms with it being in Wales. It’s not just a different country, it has a quite foreign history for me, coming from a small Yorkshire town. It’s a tale of squatters and then tenants of Chepstow Manor, smallholders in rural isolation. I have tried to honour this history and my predecessors in the garden.
And although I so want to live my whole life here, I do recognise that one day someone else will have their way with the place.
We’ve left room for others to add their dates one day. (and no, those dates are not our birth dates.)
Fortunately, Charles seems as committed as I am, and is quite happy to be in Wales. (he had a Welsh grandmother).
Charles does at least like to travel, like most other people. I find I feel a day away from here is a day (almost?) wasted. I’m used to being odd, though I have never become able to enjoy being odd.
So: when I think of all those of you out there, making gardens, how does all this affect you? Are you happy to leave your garden for pastures and prairies new? Have you changed your country and found that easy? Or could you do that? Do you mind leaving your garden to go on holiday or does it tear you apart a bit? Do you love your home, with all the challenges that that brings?
Could you bear to start all over again? (That’s Charles, at our beginnings, with an Allen Scythe)
And are you, along with us, actually a part of a strange minority? (Or perhaps we are a silent majority? I don’t think the latter really, but who knows? After all, how many more of us would wake up at 9 o’clock if the world allowed it?)
Would you refuse to leave? Are you staying put?
I am staying put!! Have too much ‘stuff’.. and where would I go? Have spent the past decades making this place just what I want so why leave now? Just have to hire more and more done by others but that’s ok. Hope someday someone will appreciate all the plantings and such that I’ve done and not take down my metal dog grave markers in the backyard!
o, yes – I want to keep my stuff! Downsizing has no appeal at all. And I have fine tuned my home too – takes years to get it just so.
Me too! In casual American slang, “I feel you.” I am fully vested in my home and gardens. Immediately upon arriving home from travel I have to “check on” my plants. I am particularly attached to a two year project area where I am removing invasive plants along a seasonal stream bed and watching all the good things reappear. Some call me an introvert. Hugs from across the Atlantic!
Yes! We will only ever be able to wave or hug from a distance, but will be doing it happily!
I’m the same. I read an article that said their are rooters and roamers. I wish I could find it. I think there should be a third category: romantic. People that just want to be with their loved one.
Remember the musical Camelot? Lancelot sings to Guinevere how could he ever leave her and goes through the 4 seasons. That sums it up about how I feel about our place. Fortunately the husband loves the house too.
I like rooters and roamers – but both could be romantic? It does help, it must help if you both feel the same!
Dare I say that I have been in this home and making this garden for 50 years? I am staying put! I did not stray far from my first home as family is most important to me but I have often thought that ‘my people’ who originated in the Yorkshire area of the UK have called me to visit that area many times. The hardest part of making a garden, for me, is realizing that it is ephemeral and will likely disappear as will I. I often think of those ahead of me who laid the stones in the walls surrounding my property. They are not the grandiose ‘walled garden’ kind of stone walls, just efficient clearing of land and hemming in livestock kind of walls from a time long passed. Perhaps there will be reminders for new tenants of the future in the laid brick patio or ornamental trees and shrubs and surely in this rickety building we call home…unless the bulldozers come and start over which is, sadly, the American way.
I am thankful to have been able to visit your very imaginative garden and to meet both you and Charles. I encourage others to seek out Veddw for a visit. It is a magical place and I can fully understand why you won’t leave.
o – I share so much of this, as well as the Yorkshire bit – our walls, our sadness about the ephemeral, thoughts about future owners and fear of (unseen) bulldozers. But not the 50 – quite yet!
Thank you for the kind words about Veddw.
I experience the same thoughts. Born and raised in California which was “home” long after we’d spent more time living elsewhere than there. Still with much family and friends there. And now in the Mid-Atlantic for two decades. And here in this garden and this home that we love. I think in terms of the next stewards of this land, but quake to think that it might be swallowed up in the eventual suburban sprawl of DC. Best to just focus on the moment lest I think of my bluebells and snowbells being turned under by bulldozers! – MW
We nearly bought a place in the Peak District where you could just see Sheffield creeping over the horizon. I’m so glad we didn’t buy it and have to watch that creep….
But yes, got to focus on today.
I’ve never felt as you do, so I find it fascinating! My husband and I are always talking about moving and turn the idea over each year, which keeps us from ever feeling fully settled, even though we’ve now been in our current home for almost 16 years and our city for 30. While I’m deeply attached to my garden, I often fantasize about leaving it and starting anew in a different style, on a smaller plot, without deer, etc, etc. I feel sure that someday we will make the leap, and it will be exciting. It’s a restless way to call a place home, but I think it’s very American to always be looking ahead instead of back.
That is so hard to imagine. I suppose I get a glimpse sometimes if I envy someone else’s house. I get history envy when people have a house older than mine!. Is that being British and looking back?!
Well, Anne, you’ve opened up a topic that folks have thoughts, feelings, and experiences with!! It will be a pleasure to read all the comments.
Personally, I have left behind four established gardens, two of them in long term rental properties! Three are spread around Maryland, USA, and one in Galveston, TX, USA. It’s always bitter sweet to move. And lots of dividing and potting has been involved in a couple instances. There is also the feeling of excitement, heading off on new garden adventures, with anticipation of new land to shape to your preferences. I often wonder how the gardens I’ve left behind have fared.
I’m 78 and have shaped my present quarter acre of gardens in Maryland for 18 years now. I love it dearly and it’s far from finished! There are several areas yet untackled, but I have visions. It will either be my forever garden, or, if I have to relocate to assisted living, I find myself wondering if I’ll be able to dig in the dirt there! Houseplants will not suffice.
To garden where you are is important.There is pleasure for some in excitement of the blank canvas, and I am one of those.
Thank you for a trip down memory lane!
You are so right in one regard: houseplants will NOT do!
I cannot leave my gardens for a new place. I tell my family to put me in the compost bin (actually donated body to the University). We travelled all over the world until my husband’s health declined. Oddly it is some ways a relief…every time I left my gardens for new ventures I wondered how they were doing in my absence. I still remember a neighbor who brought her adult son to see our gardens two days after we returned from a three week excursion. All I could see were the weeds. He saw flowers and shrubs in bloom and said to me “Mrs. Harlos you have an exquisite garden! “ Yup it is my forever garden…. never finished…
Finishing for sure will never happen. But suppose it did – we’d just have to dig up a bit and renew.
I’m doing a combination of Swedish death cleaning, anticipatory grieving for and unraveling my beloved garden of 20 years. I rent, and pressure is being put upon me to move from the house and property which I’d hoped I’d never have to leave. At 78, it’s unlikely that I’ll ever garden again at this scope. I’m grateful that I’ve had the opportunity to save a completely unknown apple tree on the property (through the Lost Apple Project, U.Washington et al), the time to make considered choices as to which plants to give to which people, which go into pots for potential relocation to an as yet unknown new home and which must be left behind( like my stunning-in-Fall Parrotia and Cotinus “Grace”), and just the incredible privilege to have lived , gardened and shared this space with the other species which inhabit it. It’s an odd, de-racinated limbo I’m living in……this space has been my second skin and this process feels like being flayed.
This is unbearable – I am so sorry to hear what you are going through. For those like us this is a real nightmare – being flayed alive is just how I imagine it must be. You have my deepest condolences.
So sad. My heart goes out to you.
Jean, I’m praying your “as yet unknown new home” will be one that allows for you to have a spot to dig in the earth and to create some new garden beds. Take care of yourself!
My husband and I have spent our entire lives in California. We are preparing to retire to New Mexico. Although I love my garden, we will be going from the temperate, 305 ft (93m) elevation in central CA to the NM high desert elevation of 6200 ft (1890m). None of my plants would survive the winter, so I’m taking nothing but the excitement of starting a new garden with a new plant pallet. The house in California is being marketed as “for gardeners” so I’m hoping the new owners will appreciate the work of 30 years, even if they decide to change things . . . but don’t break my heart and cut down my trees!
That is some change you’re planning. We managed to sell out previous house to a professional gardener, and it was a great comfort. I’ve never been back though! Best not to find out about your trees…?
Another ex-pat once told me “When you have lived in two countries, it is hard to be happy in one”.
Born in the USA on the east coast (too cold), moved to California (just right), then to France (gardening on a limestone plateau), now back in California in a hand-crafted house and garden that please me. The garden has rooted me in several places, but those roots eventually lose their grip. I’m thinking it would be lovely to create one more garden in New Zealand (no gophers).
Some of us are roamers as another commenter pointed out.
I’m happy for those who are content wherever they are planted.
That’s roaming, all right. Your ex pat friend was right for me but clearly not one bit for you. New Zealand is said to be very beautiful!
I grew up 15 miles from here. Here is home, but I mean RIGHT here, where we have lived for thirty-three years and I’ve made a garden here. Will not leave until forced.
That 15 miles could take me back to England – but, no: it could never be done.
I’m a rooter, a roamer, a romantic. Possibly many other r’s, too: a rambler, a recycler,, a reflecter, renewer, regretter. I changed countries many decades ago (from the US to Canada). I’ve lived in Europe and Asia as well as North America. Yet somehow I’ve never left both my birth state of Virginia and my adopter province of Quebec.
I left my garden in Ontario with few regrets, and the garden in Montreal with even fewer. The garden I worked on for 25+ years now belongs to my daughter and her husband and I now own the house next door, that until last fall was theirs. This spring I will begin to work on my new garden. But since it is next door and still part of the old one, I feel both rooted and displaced. An odd set of emotions I’m still trying to understand.
Yes, you are in a strange situation emotionally. A new, intimate garden may help resolve the strangeness?
Excellent topic. Love your writing!
Thank you.
Trying to stay put. I have been diagnosed with brain cancer, but seem to be on the mend now. Hubbie just died last week. House too big for me, so decisions to be made. He 7 ., mostly natives, but lots of other good plants, too. I know where they all came from, many from friends, so special. Nobody else would love them and keep them, so I hope to stay for a while. Only been here or 4h 40 years of my 85…still HOME!
Well, of course that is home and a vital lifeline in your hard, painful situation. I do hope you can find a way to stay put and continue to nurture your garden and plants.
You cannot make plans so quickly after your husband’s death – but when you can, perhaps you could share the house with someone sympathetic to your garden’s meanings?
People always offer inane advice in these situations. Forgive me – it’s the desperate wish to help.
We love our tidewater, Va home of 45+ years -many gardens always in progress-but just bought a camper van to explore the country without leaving home for long. Trying to plant more flowers, less veggies, to reduce the immediacy of harvest. We’ll see!
Ha – a compromise! Well, good luck, hope that works out for you.
I’ve moved every few years for my entire adult life – 11 different places across 20 years. I love to travel as well, and get itchy feet to see new things every few months. I’ve only ever lived in the United States, and it’s taken me a solid 6 years to feel “home” in California. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to call myself a Californian, however, as it really does feel like a different country in many ways. However, I never want to move “home” to Utah, because I didn’t enjoy the climate in every sense of the word.
However, really diving into gardening has made me a bit more restful. I’m happy to own a home once again, and don’t plan to move until we (hopefully) semi-retire in our 50s, at which point my husband and I want to move to a more rural location where we can get a few acres and I can really lean into gardening. We’re 37 now, so that’s a ways off!
Well, it is time you settled down (11 places!!) – I hope you get there early – gardens are a long time in the making.
The experience of living overseas(in Moscow, Russia) was wonderful in many ways but taught me that i need my roots, now developing a garden within a mile of my childhood home – only 24 years in so just getting started! My husband loves being there but is keener to travel than me – i rather agree with the “a day away is a day lost” approach!
Charles (my husband) travels alone and seems happy doing that. Give yours a shove and get on with that garden!
I have traveled widely but am less inclined to go too far anymore, except to visit our two children, one in Washington State, the other in Paris. It’s a drag packing and leaving. The anxiety. There’s a song title: “How can I miss you when you won’t go away.” It’s not that at all. It’s the added work that has been missing when I return.
We’d never heard of that song, Allen, but your mention of it gave us a prolonged fit of the giggles last night!
Love this post. Very thought-provoking. We are in our early 60’s and husband is already muttering about retirement villages – he resents the maintenance I think (as he stares warily at the roof that will need painting). Me, I would rather pay someone to take care of the maintenance and sacrifice other nice to haves (food, power) in order to do so. Or let the place slowly crumble and decay (shabby chic without the chic). I will never leave, I say. We have the added advantage of our 32 year old son and his partner and new baby living just 5 minutes from us and we are even on son’s route to work. Son’s memories of his childhood are tied to this house and I recall that my memories of my childhood are similarly bound to my childhood home. When my parents moved house when I was in my late teens I never connected with their new home, for I had not lived there. Visiting my parents did not have the added feeling of familiarity of place tied up with it. I want, for my son, to continue to have 2 reasons to visit.
Moving costs money, doesn’t it? Might be worth working out how much money could be saved by staying put. Spent on other people doing maintenance chores then.
My parents lived in the house I’d been brought up in until they died and I was glad of it. Made selling it a bit painful, mind.
I’m saving this rant, Anne, not only for your thoughts on the topic of leaving a well-loved garden (I’ve left three and don’t plan on leaving a fourth) but also for the poignant and heart felt comments of your readers. Thank you!
I love the comments too. What wonderfully generous people they are.