Pyrrhic Victory

It's surprising how seemingly innocuous items bring memories flooding back. Every time I see celery, I think of Sunday teatime and my father. But mostly, I think of my father. 

He adored celery and regarded being able to grow it well as the mark of an accomplished gardener. Not that he ever grew any celery himself. My father was good at many things, but gardening was not one of them. 

Instead, he based his opinion on the advice of a relative who was a fine vegetable gardener who hailed from Bristol.  He always reckoned celery was the trickiest of crops. 

My father often imparted this to me, usually as he was walking around this garden, killing time before he indulged in one of his main passions - seeing his grandchildren when they came out of school. Several times whilst he was alive, I tried growing celery, and not one batch of seeds ever came to anything. It seems the Bristolian gardener was right! 

This was no big deal at the time, after all, I couldn't stand celery. It made its seasonal appearance most Sundays, sitting in a glass jug. Eyed with equal joy and distaste by my parents and my sister and I. Whilst my parents grazed on the tender heart and inner stems, my sister and I laboured in vain on the tough outer stalks. Not at all encouraged by my father's advice that "celery is good for you". 

Still, it would have been nice to present him with some home-grown celery. Ironically, the year after his death I managed to grow a remarkable crop of celery. Attempting to bury my grief, deep in the rich earth beneath my muddy boots, I stumbled across pots of celery seedlings for sale in a local garden centre. 

I nurtured those plants just as the garden nurtured me. I realised that gardening can be much more than growing plants. I also realised that when I cut that celery, what a pointless exercise the whole thing had been. The very person who I'd gone to all the effort to grow was not there to taste the fruits of my labour. 

Nevertheless, the celery crop ended up enriching the soil via the compost heap. And my father enriched the lives of all who made his acquaintance. 

In memory of John Anthony Beards 

1930-2005 

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