Blooming Portchester
The energy will not be suppressed
I am not a flower expert — but Portchester demands that such deficiencies be bloomin’ well corrected.
Such is my inability to remember common plant names that plant identifying apps on my phone must work overtime. I defy anyone to walk past the vicarage and not admire the vicar’s pink blooms. Hydrangeas (as I have now learned to call them) have been out in force this year — and in so many varieties. Not just the conventional flower balls but extraordinary versions that, at first sight, might seem to be an entirely different species.
Nor is it only front gardens and porches that cheer early morning walkers. Beyond the brambles that now crowd the paths along Cow Lane and through to the shoreline, are fields full of flowers that have been keeping bees and butterflies busy since early May — ever since the Parks department descended en masse to give the place its annual haircut. The relentless urge of nature to reassert itself is as impressive as the fallen trunks being consumed and recycled by small armies of insects — leastways those trunks not carted off through the woods to make this year’s seats for growing teens. Soon they’ll be away for tutorials, job interviews, or committee meetings, but few will be so life enhancing.
A longer walk today takes me beyond my normal bounds and almost properly onto Fareham Creek. Even boats seem to have this urge to multiply — Wicor boatyard’s pontoon spine now extends so far that sailors trundling gear back to shore must find Salt Café a welcome pit stop on their journey home. In the post-Olympic rush of energy, the next field along will see renewed growth of hoop shooting, ball kicking, skateboarding, BMX pedalling (thanks Declan) and park running, and, along the shoreline, young minds will sail off on new adventures.
The energy of it all — the relentless will to leave lockdowns behind — will not be suppressed. Now at their height, Portchester’s blooms will hang on for as long as possible — surviving even the inevitable ‘back to school’ resets and (deep breath) vault into next year’s dreams to bloom once again. I might even plant one of the Hydrangea paniculata (an appropriately pointy-head variety) in the front garden just to show off. Bloomin’ marvellous.
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Portchester, Hampshire (the old one) sits at the northern end of Portsmouth Harbour between Paulsgrove Lake and Fareham Creek