Natural Remedy

There’s something about greenery. 

Well actually, it’s not really green at all. The countryside is a bonkers, absurd, technicolor trip. Right now even the leaves on the trees at Rowan Farm vary from acid green to burnt orange to blood red. There’s an amaranthine array of bluebells strewn about the place. 

I don’t know why but there is something about this crazy kaleidoscope that’s just good for you. And the more you engage with it, the better it makes you feel. 

I know naff all about colour therapy. I know next to naff all about horticulture. And I imagine by now I’ve demonstrated that I know precisely naff all about the countryside (although I’m doing my bleeding best). 

But the flora and fauna and the effort that they command to help them flourish is nourishing in a way that I’m only beginning to realise, let alone understand. 

The thing is though you have to consent to nature for it to get at you. Otherwise you can easily be emotionally immune to it. I admit I was for most of my life up until now. 

That’s the thing about having been a proper, committed townie. Trees were to decorate pavements. Insects needed exterminating on sight. Salad leaves came in plastic bags. 

So when that gaudy greenery gets me now, it still takes my breath away. It’s such a powerful draw and seems somehow magnified by the magic that’s in the soil at Rowan Farm. 

The wellbeing of this exceptional environment is my and Oli’s lucky responsibility. We’re muddling along. We have so much still to learn. 

Sometimes I catch myself relapsing to my old townie habits. 

Without boring you with the details, I arrived on site today with my knickers in a bit of a twist. I strode up to inspect our newly installed rooflights without once pausing to take in the most spectacular spring day yet this year. 

Oli working on the scaffold in front of the newly installed rooflights 

It was not until I stood at the window, looking out, that it happened. 

Framed in the glass, Rowan Farm came in and embraced me and my funk disappeared.

If you think this sounds like a load of hippy nonsense, I don’t blame you. Before my love affair with Rowan Farm, I’d have thought so too. 

But I urge you to give the countryside a whirl. 

Get outside; pause to take in the noisy, brash assault a rural field has on every single sense; and then get to work. 

There’s no drug, therapy, spa day that I’ve experienced that comes close to giving you the same calm high. 

Our door is open at Rowan Farm if you fancy dipping your toe in… We love a bit of free labour.