youTV gardeners are a serene species. A snip here, a bit of a pot there, their blades breaking up the rich, dark soil as they murmur words of wisdom and love. The soundtrack is as soft and peaceful as the birds singing their gratitude from the bushes and trees. All is well in the gardens of the television gardeners.
Cut to any garden shows you might host. There would be no birdsong for a soundtrack, just heavy metal, as brutal as the sound of my shovel hitting another immovable rock. When Lemmy assembled Motörhead, he said his music would be “loud, fast, urban, shrill, arrogant, paranoid, speed freak rock’n’roll. It will be so loud that if we move next door, your lawn will die.” Yeah, the Motörhead sound will be just the ticket to my gardening show. It is not for me the standard environment of working with nature. It will be man against nature, a battle with only one winner, and it will not be me.
There won’t be any Monty Don quietly approaching little pot plants you’ve lovingly grown from seed. No dog will doze sybaritically on the path among the green beans and azaleas. Peace is simply not possible in my garden. If I sleep, I lose. As it grows and grows, I have to trim and trim. If I don’t, I’ll be overwhelmed, swamped by a green tide. It’s relentless. The waste is appalling. I borrowed a colleague’s shredding machine, like a giant paper shredder that I feed branches and leaves from a mountain into. And the shorter, the more it grows. I slash, collect, haul, feed the machine, scoop out bags of dense debris, and so on, ad infinitum, faster and faster, until, drenched in sweat, blood seeps from the scratches on my arms. , and my pulse races in my temples, I fall to my knees, defeated.
Where are the scenes of Monty Don fighting this unwinnable war? I suppose there are squadrons of TV production grads with work experience who steer clear of sight and sound, probably working nights under arc lights. Please someone commission my gardening program. The truth needs to be told.