Wormwood! Wormwood!

[Barry]

Do you feel differently about different parts of your vegetable garden? At my old allotment, there was an area of gooseberry bushes and an old, spreading cherry tree where the atmosphere felt 'different'in the sense that I instantly didn't like that part of the plot. At my new allotment, I am carving a plot out of an area which is hemmed in on three sides by trees and bushes. Today, I was digging along the fence line, which separates the allotment site from the railway, and felt 'uncomfortable'. I think what generated this feeling was a sense of rot and decay that I was getting from digging out rotted pallets, stinging nettles and tree roots. It didn't feel like an area of 'life' if you know what I mean. Wormwood! Wormwood! said my brain.
I recall when I was very young feeling exactly the same way from an area of my dad's garden, where ferns and moss grew, but not other plants. This was backed by a lilac tree, whose branches would often become green covered, unnaturally so.
Anybody else out there get uncomfortable feelings from parts of their plots?

[oldherbaceous]

Good eveing Barry, i must say i have never had those feelings on any of my plots, but when i was in the building game, we had a big under pinning job on a very old cottage.
I had dug two of the holes, but as soon as i had got a foot down on the third, i started getting this strange feeling.
This hole had to be eight feet deep, and the deeper i got i could start to smell this strange musty smell that i can only describe as what i would imagine death to smell of.
This really spooked the bloke i was working with and he wouldn't come near the hole.
I never believe in any thing like that normally, but i must say i was very glad to get that one finished.
So after that experience, i know exactly what you are on about.

[richard p]

lots of people find there are places they dont like but cant give a reason for it, on a sub consious level you are picking up something, quite what we could write a book on, some people would speculate that the place retains memories of an unpleasant event, others would talk about negative energy fields , etc . it is now accepted that humans have more than the generally accepted five senses but few of us knowingly use them . at the end of the day you are picking up something , but whatever it is main stream science isnt clever enough to have found a way of detecting and measuring it or have found a mechanism in the body to do so,so therefore it cant exist and you must be imagining it

[jopsy]

barry dont suppose you're pregnant?
when i was pg i found i was far more susceptible to strange things!
my friends dh is a vicar and he said that pg women often ring him to bless places that they feel are sad
i saw someone at the end of my bed a few times during the 9 months and it wasn't dh!

[Barry]

I don't think it is anything supernatural. I suspect I may have chanced upon a micro-climate brought about by a lack of the freeflow of air around a certain area. The more open an area, the more positive I feel about it! Dying and decaying wood (which is a particular feature of the part of the new plot I originally mentioned) seems to trigger this feeling of discomfort. In contrast, areas which are not hemmed in by anything feel light and airy. Are we genetically wired to pick out open areas in which to grow vegetables, I wonder? It would make sense, especially since disease is often linked to areas of stagnancy, where you don't get free air flows. Chew on that!!

[peter]

Barry, did you ever get stuck in a musty cupboard when playin hide and seek as a little child, or any similar "wardrobe malfunction" ?

It could be the submerged bad memories of an event like that which are triggered by the evocative smell.

[oldherbaceous]

I bet you lot knew i couldn't help but to respond to Jopsy's answer.
Dear Jopsy i think what you experienced at the bottom of your bed, was less like a strange experience, but more like a fantasy.
I wonder who it was.

[Chantal]

I've never experienced anything like that but my grandmother tells a tale about her childhood. She and her brothers and parents lived in a tied farm cottage. She always felt uncomfortable around the kitchen fireplace and disliked being near it. When the cottage was eventually demolished they found the skeleton of a small child buried under the fireplace.

True or not, I don't know, but the elder members our family have always said she had a sixth sense. A couple of things she said did freak me out. I was staying with her as a child and she told me that Kennedy would die very soon; he was shot the following day. I was staying with her again when she announced that his brother would be shot too and he was, less than 12 hours later.

I know this happened, I was only small but I remember it well. Chance statements?

You should have started this thread on Hallowe'en; we could have scared ourselves silly.

[jopsy]

peter thats v funny
OH im sorry but it wasnt you! ( i dont think)
chantal your gran sounds v interesting

barry i cant chew i have no teeth!

[Chantal]

Jo, my gran is now madder than a box of frogs; unless the social services psychiatrist is doing an assessment and she's totally sane.

However, she's told me this story loads of times and never varied by one iota. What's more, when they moved to the cottage the neighbours told them "you don't want to live there, a child always dies in that house" which her parents just laughed at. Her elder brother John died a year later from mumps. Her younger brother, also John as he was born a couple of months after the other John died, died of food ptomaine poisoning when he was five. She was always convinced the house was bad.

I don't know what to think. I love my grandmother and hear what she says but I am highly sceptical.

[jopsy]

you know i think some people really are given a deeper insight
v sad about her brothers though
mad people are much more fun!
im sure you know that tho

[Chantal]

Yeah, she's 90 now and she still cries for them which is really sad.

[oldherbaceous]

Dear Jopsy, you would have known if it was me, i would have been cracking terrible jokes about your cooking.

[jopsy]

chantal my old neighbour is in her 90's she's the toughest old stick i know!
OH i didn't even know you then!!

[oldherbaceous]

And i bet you wish you didn't know me now at times, don't you Jopsy.