Yamamomo

Today I planted a yamamomo (Myrica rubra) on the site where there compost used to be. This is an evergreen tree that grows quite large, and so hopefully it will screen off the garden from the footpath that passes further up the hill. It also produces strange red fruit. These aren't terribly pleasant to eat fresh, but my mother in law makes a very nice drink by soaking them in cheap brandy. Most medicinal it is. The fruit should also serve quite well as jam. For those who are interested in such things, the type is 'Moriguchi', whatever the hell difference that makes.

The missus has said that our (my) garden looks like a 'shizai okiba', that is, a scrap yard or lumber yard. The description is not without justice, and I've felt the same thing myself. But it hurts to hear it out loud. Today, though, with a small fruit tree where the compost used to sit, visible to one and all from the front gate, and with a naturalistic stone wall where there was originally a very scruffy agglomeration of lumber and bamboo, I can't help feeling that things have been tidied up considerably. One of these fine days I feel I might challenge the missus to look out the window and see if she can still say that it looks like builder's merchant's.

I'm hoping that the yamamomo feels blessed, sited as it is on a one-time compost enclosure.