There truly is nothing like the smell of GoodGym on a Saturday morning. It smells like victory and this time was no exception, as we helped Mrs A. to bring her garden back into use.

As our crack squad of six amateur gardeners shrugged off the cold and assessed the task in hand, we quickly decided that just clearing away rubbish and digging up thorn bushes would be way too easy, and that the decidedly dodgy makeshift decking (rotting pallets) needed shifting as well.

This of course meant assigning the puniest members of our team (myself and Axel) to clear transfer “much heavier than they look” pallets round from the back of the house to the front to be collected by the council (more on this drama later). While we moaned about our aching arms, the rest of the team (Andrew, Beth, David and Kevin) got on with the much more serious task of clearing the garden of rubbish, weeds and thorns. This was seriously tough work as evidenced by the many yelps and curses as the vegetation struggled to fight back against their onslaught (I say it was tough work – as you can see from the picture above with tea in my hand, I’m clearly having to use my empathy skills to imagine their plight).

After 2-3 hours of hard graft, we’d recovered the garden which is actually a nice big space, and even Mrs. A could get out and help with a bit of pruning! With time running low, we cleared up as best we could and moved as much of the debris out to the front for the council to come and pick up. But there was a twist in this tale!

Unfortunately in our haste to do good, we’d inadvertently created a minor fire hazard for one of the neighbours! No matter, after a spot of community negotiation skills and renewed energy (knowing a well deserved lunch was not far away) we quickly tidied the product of labour, leaving the neighbours satisfied and so impressed they offered to pay us to do their garden (income generating arm perhaps?).

A we tucked into pizzas at the local pub, there were smiles all round as there were when we left the mission. Another GoodGym triumph!

Alex.