Memorable menopausal moments

I had one of those memorable menopausal moments recently. You know the kind - where your brain suddenly behaves like it’s been quietly replaced overnight by a slightly confused goldfish.

It happened at the petrol station. Normally this is a simple operation. I pull up to my usual pump, open the petrol cap, fill the car, and leave feeling like a fully competent adult. But on this day the station was busy. Someone started a war and everyone panicked, so the forecourt was unusually crowded.

No problem, I thought. I’ll just pull into a different space.

I parked. But our ute and car have petrol caps on opposite sides. Which means every time I approach a pump, I’m effectively playing a small game of menopausal roulette.

Once parked and ready to disembark, I realised the petrol cap was on the other side of the car. So, I thought, no matter. I’ll just reverse around into the other space.

I did that. And somehow managed to recreate exactly the same problem. At this point I paused and stared at the petrol station forecourt like a general surveying a battlefield. Where, exactly, was the one position in which my petrol cap would actually be on the correct side of a pump?

WHY don’t petrol stations still have those wonderfully long hoses you can drag across the car if necessary? I’m sure they used to exist. Perhaps they were removed specifically to test the cognitive resilience of menopausal women.

Eventually - after repositioning the car several times in a manoeuvre that probably resembled an elaborate driving test failure - I found the correct pump on my third attempt.

I have no doubt the other drivers were watching and wondering what kind of baffling incompetence they were witnessing. And once upon a time I would have been utterly mortified.

Now? Now I simply think, “oh well, I guess I can add that to my list of ‘pending newsletter content.’”

Because if I’m blatantly honest about it, this sort of menopausal buffoonery doesn’t just happen in public. I also perform it privately, in the garden. Consistency is important. For example: Where’s my trowel? I definitely had it recently. Not long ago at all. But now it’s vanished completely.

Once upon a time I would’ve calmly retraced my steps and located it within minutes. Now I can’t remember what those steps even were. So, a new garden game has emerged. Find the Trowel. It’s like a treasure hunt, except I’m both the person who hid the treasure and the person who has absolutely no recollection of doing so.

Then there are the kitchen scissors.

My husband now asks, with great regularity, “Where are the kitchen scissors?” And I instantly know the answer. They are almost certainly somewhere in the garden. Because I probably took them outside to cut some twine, or deadhead something, or harvest a handful of herbs. And I probably thought, very confidently, I must remember to bring these back inside.

And then I absolutely did not.

So, off I go into the garden to search the flower beds until the scissors are discovered in some entirely random location. These days my husband doesn’t even seem surprised. I just shrug and say the magic word: Menopause.

The same explanation applies to the shovel incident. After unloading a trailer full of compost, I smugly thought “I’m the Queen of Efficiency”, and so I loaded the shovel into the ute, the wheelbarrow onto the trailer and returned everything to its rightful place. Or so I thought.

Several days later I wondered where the shovel had gone. The shovel, it turns out, had gone to work with my husband. This would be mildly inconvenient under normal circumstances, but he happens to be an airline pilot. Which means the ute - and therefore the shovel - had departed for several days.

So, there I was, standing in the garden, staring at the empty space where the shovel should’ve been, slowly reconstructing the chain of menopausal decision-making that led to this outcome.

Once upon a time I would’ve reacted to all of this with deep embarrassment. How could my brain possibly be doing this? Now I’ve moved into a different phase. It’s more of a quiet shrug. A philosophical acceptance. Ah. Menopause brain…again.

So, I’d like to offer a sincere apology to every middle-aged woman I’ve ever silently judged in a petrol station car park. The ones who circled pumps a few times before finally positioning their car correctly. Once, I may have thought you seemed a little…simple in the head. Now? Now I understand.

And to every younger woman reading this newsletter, I have only one thing to say:

Just you wait.

Did you know

Scientists successfully germinated a 2,000-year-old Judean date palm seed discovered during archaeological excavations near the Dead Sea — which means somewhere in the world there is a plant older than many empires, quietly photosynthesising after an extremely committed nap. The seed, nicknamed “Methuselah,” had sat dormant since around the time the Romans were building aqueducts and people still thought bathing too often might kill you. Even more astonishingly, researchers later managed to grow additional ancient seeds, proving that under the right dry conditions, life can linger far longer than we imagine. This is encouraging news for anyone currently side-eyeing a packet of lettuce seeds from 2014 at the back of the shed.

What to do in the garden this week

Northern hemisphere

• 💦If you’re planning on mulching at this time of year make sure you water deeply first otherwise you’re just locking in dryness.

• 🌳Check tree ties and stakes. It’s one of the most forgotten jobs. Trees are actively growing at this time of year, and old ties can begin girdling trunks very quickly. Loosen or replace anything tight to avoid a well girdled tree trunk snapping in a decent wind gust. Ask me how I know!!

• 🌿Quite a few plants actually perform better in less fertile soil. Lavender, rosemary, salvias and many Mediterranean herbs prefer less nitrogen. Too much feeding can give floppy growth and fewer flowers.

• 🏡Shade your greenhouse before the brutal heatwave. Overheated greenhouses can cause plants to stall for weeks. You can put up shade cloth or get that special greenhouse paint for shading, set up better airflow and wet the paths to increase humidity. Preventative measures are generally better than reactive ones.

Southern hemisphere

• ❄️Winter gardens can still dry out so keep an eye on pots under eaves, newly planted trees, broadleaf evergreens and greenhouse beds. I often fall into the trap after a week of rain and forget to water my greenhouse beds. Duh!

• 🌿Try the old-school trick of forcing rhubarb. By covering the crowns with buckets, pots or forcing jars, your rhubarb plant will product earlier, sweeter, more tender stems.

• 🌼Now is a good time to lightly prune passionfruit. You can remove dead growth, tangled stems and overcrowded sections without triggering huge soft regrowth before spring.

• 🪱Feed soil in winter, not plants. Winter is ideal for adding compost, worm castings, aged manure and leaf mould. You’re feeding the soil while the plants are mostly dormant which means it’s well prepared for their next growth spurt in spring.

What’s new for paid subscribers this week

• Tuesday: a feature plant. Now THIS one is going to surprise you.

• Thursday: and this one probably won’t, but it’s very much an all-time favourite that every garden shouldn’t be without. A comprehensive deep-dive into lilies in all their forms.

Is that paywall getting you down? If so, come and join us on the other side. The side where all the really good stuff lives. For less than the cost of a takeaway coffee (or hot choccie - because let’s face it, coffee tastes like burnt dirt) you can access the large archive of information that’s going to entertain you while teaching you how to become a better, more confident gardener. Go on. You know you want to:)