Hello from the Garden
Farewell to Peter Dowling
One of our long term garden volunteers is hanging up his garden gloves at Violet Street and taking on a new pair in a paid capacity with Mad Cow gardening services. Peter has been the main force behind the repair and refurbishment of our stone retaining walls; working rain, hail or shine over the years he has been with us. His steady, reliable and companionable company will be missed. He has provided landscape and plant selection ideas for several areas around the school and his creative input has left some beautiful reminders.
Peter has shared his Violet Street Story below, it is a story which may be familiar as gardening provides so much more than just produce or flowers.
The Wall
When my volunteer gardening at Violet Street began in July 2018, I was coming out of a three-year period of depression due the breakup of a marriage and other factors. Just earlier, during early morning walks, Violet St mystified me with its extensive vegetable beds at the corner of Nettle and Violet Streets – was this a community garden? – yet other ornamental garden beds were unkempt. Everywhere man, Roy, set me straight.
Brian was the school gardener back then and the first task he gave me was weeding along the garden compound embankment wall, to soon realize I knew my weeds. At the same time, I quickly became concerned about the deteriorating condition of the wall: gaping holes, loose stones and crumbling lime mortar.
We soon agreed the best utilization of my skills was to have an on-going project whereby I could come to school and just get on with it; restoring the wall. Over the next three years, volunteering six hours/week during term time, the wall came together again. Holes were filled (a big one near the corner had slabs of slate jammed in and this set a trend for several grooves further along the south wall), a capstone layer was inserted below the bottom rail of the fence and most of the mortaring was re-pointed.
The wall became a source of on-going joy – like doing a giant jigsaw puzzle, finding the right stone – and self-pride in returning to my usual self after the depression. Depression was a downward spiral thinking no-one cared about me. Spiralling up again involved digging deep, hitting upon a plan for life again and then came the wall, a project which was both simple and yet very absorbing. I can now understand why Winston Churchill used to build brick walls when he was having his ‘black dog’ periods.
Thank you Brian for I have long suspected you knew I needed something to absorb me; Mandy for allowing me a free rein; and Sara (who replaced Brian) for her support in recognizing that restoring the wall and a couple of other small stone projects such as the oval ramp side wall and the Webster Street alcove bench seat (it has become so popular) were all tasks that added to the appearance of the school.
These days, with my volunteering at the school coming to an end, when driving up Violet St towards the wall, I look at the it with pride and wonder how did I ever find the time.
Thankyou Peter, you have left a fine legacy.
Garden Activity
This week we have been looking at seeds and talking about how we can collect them to plant again next year. Some of our students could even tell the difference between snow peas and pea seeds!
See If you can identify these different seeds!
Ms Burton's grade 1/2's got busy in the chook garden for their last gardening session of the year! Beautiful work everyone.
