Tart in the City

I have never claimed to be anything else but a Townie.

The word, often used disparagingly by those who live in the countryside, is of course that given to urban dwellers with little or no affinity for or liking of the big wide open spaces.

I see nothing wrong with being close to shops and amenities even if it is at the sacrifice of, well, a view of meadows, trees and hills.

In fact, in the course of my daily work I do spend quite a bit of time in villages and rural areas and although I can appreciate the value of a certain tranquility and remoteness they are not qualities or attributes that I feel are important in determining the quality of life, and particularly in the context of a modern existence.

Against the positives of living out of a town or city you have to consider such things as poor access to the internet, a reliance on your own transport, lack of decent shops and services and the tendency, in productive agricultural areas for there to be quite an oppressive odour from animal waste and chemical sprays, not to mention the obstruction of traffic from slow moving farm machinery such as tractors, combines and trailers.

In the last couple of weeks I have been crawling along usually free flowing highways as a consequence of a lone vehicle attached to a piece of equipment.

In these days of large scale farming and contract working it is often the case that a tractor, for example, has to travel some distance between its base and the field and quite regularly rather than, in the past ,when each individual farmstead would have its own vehicles operating within a tight catchment of land which may not necessarily have involved having to use a main road.

I did work a full summer holiday when I was 17 on a farm that belonged to a friend's family and also had a couple of years in the Young Farmer's Organisation, a sort of social club for sons and daughters of the landed class. Given my opening sentence this subsequent revelation of  mixing with rural types may imply that I was somehow an insurgent, an undercover Townie but in fact I recall those times with much affection.

We are currently, it being July, in the early part of the harvest season in UK agriculture.

The short bodied tipper trucks, badged as working for Birds Eye Frozen Foods are a very common sight as they flit from pea viner to the factory, often leaving a thin trail of green vegetable juice in their wake.

This prolonged dry spell and record temperatures appear to have accelerated the ripening process of the cereal crops and this has been clearly illustrated on a recent satellite photo of Britain whose much lauded green and pleasant land has turned quite a parched light brown.

With the increase in the rate of the gathering in of the crops comes a reduction in air quality and I genuinely feel sorry for those who suffer from hay fever and other related allergies.

In our part of the city, well, confined to our small south facing brick paved rear courtyard we completed the first part of  our own harvest this afternoon.

It was done with minimal disruption to our neighbours although I admit to doing a bit of a dance in marking the end of a problematic growing season.

At first there was doubt as to whether the crop would be able to establish itself and flourish in what was, after all, a plastic tub.

There were issues over the quality of the soil, excavated from a small patch also at the back of the house which historically had been the site of a French Convent building.

The recommended enrichment process was followed with the purchase of a bag, on special offer, of compost from a city supermarket forecourt and regular saturation from the water tap in our garage which opens out onto the urban courtyard.

On a few mornings the soil from the tub could be seen strewn over the brick paving and we put this down to the activities of a cat in its toilet routine or perhaps a squirrel or even one of the foxes who frequent our corner of the city.

In spite of these threats we have marvelled at the progress of our very own urban fruit farm consisting of one each of olive, lemon, orange and bay trees and in particular, the focus of today's harvesting - a cherry tree.

Yes, I am proud to report a yield of two cherries.

It will not have any effect on import/export figures nor cause panic amongst the owners of traditional cherry orchards in Eastern and Southern Europe but the sourness and tartness of those two plump and juicy fruits was a wonder to behold.

The whole process took little more than a few seconds but was most enjoyable.

We could have saved at least one of the cherries for insertion into a cocktail or to sit atop a home made trifle but the heat of the moment and a deep rooted sense of achievement took over in our own celebration of being Townies.