Bottle cottage, the reason why...

I am so pleased I didn't buy.

Picture the scene,

the weather was not dissimilar 
from today's.

Warm, with acres of sky, the blue,

 enough to make a flotilla

of matelots a new bell-bottomed suit.

The sun shone low over fields groaning with

wheat fit to burst.

H.E Bates couldn't have painted with words 

a more idyllic Kentish countryside.

For me it was love at first sight.

The fecund woman, with belly full of no more than a tadpole
size baby, I took to instantly.

The walls of the cottage were full of her art... 

scantily-clad Ma Larkins, slithered off the walls and

into my soul.

No matter the kitchen resembled a broom cupboard,

the bedrooms would have been palatial...

to a mouse.

The garden was the size of a hen's handkerchief.

Then a short way off,

 an allotment which was full to overflowing.

In my mind's eye it was mine.

Ted, on pain of death said nothing,

as instructed!

He, I could tell... knew it wasn't practical!

Lots of us wanted it, 

the couple were going back to 

New Zealand to produce a Kiwi baby.

I put in my offer which was not enough,

I upped it...

but as luck would have it,

another was in a better financial shape than me.

Although, she wanted me to have it 

and argued my case with her man. 

He was adamant, they should play safe.

And who could blame him?

Broken hearted, I thought 

I'll never find another as sweet. 

That is until I found here.

Sitting in the shade of the magnolia,

with Lettice in the last days of her life.

This wonderful garden has been

her joy, her domain; 

no matter she's been shouted at over the years,

as she's sat in the herbaceous border.

When I first viewed the cottage 

the garden was so overgrown 

we had no idea of its size.

She phoned much later to ask

if I was still interested.

Sadly I said no, with the rider of, 

'As it has turned out I've found a much 

better size-wise buy.'

I often think of that wonderful

couple and their child of

ten summers.

Ted has said many times,

that as my IFA,

he would have found a way of

making me see the error of

my rose-tinted view of the cottage set 

in the undulating fields of ripe corn,

in that magical summer of 2003.

Yesterday, we had a scare with Lettice,

her days are rapidly coming to an end.

I carried her up to be with us in the garden:

her garden.
Slowly she tottered around, reacquainting
herself with the sights and smells.
Happy to be back patrolling her patch, 
as only a collie can.

For her sake I am pleased

Bottle Cottage, wasn't meant to be.

♡♡♡