Playing With Water Read Free Page A

sprouted after a disease turned it to a skeleton. I got rid of the caterpillars and fed the lemon with Thrive fertiliser and tea leaves. It is a strange thing that two plants in almost the same position will grow so differently. For instance, the cumquat Fortunella japonica in a pot has been heavy with orange fruits and is now in bright green leaf. Perhaps it is simply that the lemon is just where the butterfly laid the eggs, nothing more to it than that. Around the edges of these pots lobelias’ deep blue flowers are spilling over. But not as many as I would wish, because, curiouslyagain, the pot holding the tormented lemon has healthy lobelia and many of those planted around the cumquat died and more must be planted there.
    Last week, after waiting more than a month for a Sacred Lily of the Incas (Ismene festalis) to come up, I thought it must be dead and almost dug down to see. Then it came up with dark green strappy leaves. It is best to be patient, even when in doubt. If I had dug down, not being certain where the bulb was, I could have ruined it. This white spider lily has a most delicious scent. There are about forty species of these Hymenocallis lilies. I bought the bulb in Woolworths in Corrimal because of the story in Sophocles’ play, Antigone. Ismene was the one who would not help her sister, Antigone, bury their brother, Polynices, when he was killed and, at King Creon’s behest, left for the birds.
    And still down comes the rain. The wheelbarrow is my rain gauge. At a glance it shows how much rain there’s been.
    The two olive trees I planted on the front nature strip beside the road have been ravaged by vandals. Two days ago I dug up an olive tree which I had planted in the back garden rather too closely to the new blood orange tree. I took this one out to the road where the other olive had been torn out and hung upside down in the branches of its sister tree. I had replanted the torn-up tree after soaking it in a bucket of water, but it died nonetheless.So now a third tree is in the hole. The first was stolen, never to be seen again. Terry kindly searched the district for me, looking over fences and in the school yard that adjoins our back fences, but he found nothing.
    People had told me I would not be able to grow trees in the street and it began to look as though they were right. Rage rose in me and I rode off to a hardware shop. Phil, my neighbour on the other side, had told me that only star pickets and cement would save the trees. Not sure what star pickets were, I asked Terry and he said that I would only be giving the vandals a weapon if I used them. They are simply a long star-shaped iron picket used for fences and staking. I bought star pickets, instant cement and a roll of barbed wire and one of chicken wire. With the energy that comes from pitting your will against another’s, I dug holes and filled them with cement and stuck the pickets in. Then I wrapped the wires around the pickets that surrounded the trees. In a few hours the trees were wrapped as if in a war zone. They looked strange but beautiful; the emblem of peace in barbed wire. I put a bath towel over the newly planted tree to shade it on a hot day. The towel was taken while Philippa and I had morning tea. Now Terry has given me old shorts which were dusters to shade the tree. It has gone into shock, but is well watered. People shake their heads and tell me it is hopeless, but I am not giving up yet. Paragon, Verdale and Manzanillo are the best olives for this area, I read in the newspaper, so theyare what I planted. ‘You’ll never grow trees in this street, Kate,’ Phil said. Well, we’ll see about that.
    Speaking of olives, here is a recipe that uses quite a lot of olive oil.
C APONATA
1 small bunch of celery or half a big one, chopped
    4 or 5 large glossy eggplants, chopped
    4 onions, peeled and cut into chunks
    1 cup of vinegar (not balsamic)
    1 / 2 cup of capers
    2 tablespoons of brown sugar
    1 / 2 cup of tomato