Every now and then I get back ache, and thus end up in a pre-emptive visit to my local physio, Martha, who is brilliant. Physio, however, is not cheap, whereas owning an allotment is. A non sequitur? No, as the more digging and weeding and picking and barrowing I do the fewer problems I have with my back. Yesterday we cleared space for optimistic late-August plantings (lettuce, endive, beet, chard, rocket...), weeded Hamburg parsley and celeriac beds, and generally tidied up at summer's end. Today I feel like a 20-year-old (something my wife would frown on).
Our annual allotment rental is the price of two sessions of physio. Not a complaint about Martha's pricing, which is very reasonable, but a comment on how cheap even after several price rises our allotment is for what it gives in return.
There are of course several other elements to that health boost. In terms of emotional well-being the sight of beds full of delicious veg can only be good. And as regards the inner man, when your daily diet includes lettuce, fresh herbs, courgettes, sweetcorn, spuds, kohl rabi, turnip, beetroot and carrot all picked or dug that day there is no need for vitamin pills (supposedly bad for you anyway), supplements, or any resort to those disgusting penances of wholewheat pasta, brown rice or bran-flakes.
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