January

Happy New Moon

Is it a coincidence that all of the flowers out now are fresh and white? In this first week of a whole new year, the frost is crisp and the moon is a sliver.

All clean slates and fresh starts and resolutions to do better with skincare and drinking water. Putting the cork back in the champagne.

Or is it? In December I was all for feeling like January was a corner to be turned. Now it’s here, I can’t help nudging everything right a bit. The days are still dark, the greenhouse is still shut fast against the gales, and the cold has so deep that any sweet pea seedling not in full leaf has been retrieved from the courtyard and returned to the scullery.

I am wondering whether our calendar’s new year is poorly timed. Is it ok if I just light the fire and wait for Imbolc? There will be more light and more warmth and the flowers will be, not fresh, cool white, but narcissi yellow. (Pale yellow obviously, I’m not an animal.)

Or maybe… the equinox?

Until then, I am just hanging on to the signs of hope. As well as the quince and the hellebores and the incredible winter clematis, I was overjoyed to see the first of my ludicrously expensive snowdrops return on New Year’s Eve. Not just the earliest but, to my mind, the loveliest. Welcome to 2025, Galanthus elwesii 'Godfrey Owen'. You’ve made me very happy indeed.