I’m in the garden writing this. It’s not raining. There is so much life out here. The goosegrass is running around, clambering over the old gnome, whose name I have temporarily forgotten. There are seedlings of everything everywhere: teasle, nipplewort, feverfew, buttercup, chickweed. The angelica I planted last year is looking sturdy. That is exciting. It’s one of those plants I have wanted for a long time, a plant that once settled with look after itself and return year after year, but I have never before managed to get it settled. This year is angelica year – soon I will have an endless supply of angelica stem to crystallise!

I had an idea that the blog this week would be about wanting things, or more particularly about not wanting things. It seemed to me that if you didn’t want things you could be happy. I’m not sure what I thought I meant. It’s quite easy for me to not want things because I have all the essentials: a house, a pension income, food, family, a garden.

I think it’s best if stick to gardening, maybe writing about that: the filling almond blossom, the scarlet ball buds of the rhubarb, the clusters of comfrey leaves. The fine fern-like leaves of the sweet cicely, the soft yellow primrose flowers.

A couple of crows wander over, arguing. The sky is darkening. Jackdaws steam through and a wood pigeon applauds.

Do I want things? Do I not want things? I think yes. And then I think no. And then I stop thinking and have a one sided conversation with the old gnome. He smokes his pipe and dozes.

I have a feeling that I mean something else, something more. It’s about personal peace. About wanting things I can’t have, about doing what I have to do to get what I want and accepting that sometimes the only way to get something is to trust to the universe. Or the weather. If the almond blossom opens fully and then there is a frost there will be no almonds. But even then there will be a moment when the blossom is there and is beautiful. Even now, as the buds fatten it is beautiful!