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January roses
Jan. 18th, 2012 10:57 amI have always wanted a rose garden.
Not so much for the roses, although I love roses, but for the pure romance of the name. Rose garden. The sort of name that means fairies and dreams and magic. And because when I was very very small, we had one – a mess of roses in the tiny back yard that formed an impenetrable wall that whispered of the magic behind it, a wall watched by me and my doll Tina and our large dog* for magic or fairies or Muppets.
I never did get through those roses, even in winter when they slept.
Our later journeys were not conducive to rose gardening, although they did include visits to rose gardens throughout the world, some in great shape, some dying. Apartment living in South Florida was even worse, although I did buy the occasional bush or miniature roses just to watch them sag over and die. I had, you might say, a gift for it, and eventually decided to mostly stick to easier plants that said, yeah, yeah, so the sunlight wasn't exact or you forgot me for a couple days. I'm going to grow anyway.
When we came here, the front lawn had three rose bushes in decidedly awful shape, but one was pushing forward magnificent roses in pure defiance of the rest of its very dead state. We moved one bush (it was pretty much dying anyway) and I put coffee grounds on the others and brought in more rose bushes, including some miniature ones and hoped.
And learned that these roses can probably be best called mercurial.
One week, a bush is dying, miserable, drooping with a KILL ME NOW look; the next week, it's blooming. That bush in the very dead state when we arrived, that various people strongly suggested should be uprooted to end its misery? Is today the best and healthiest bush out there, without a single rose. Meanwhile, the most straggly bush is gleaming with the garden's single rose. Another rose, which I had given up on after it turned to a single stick, just pushed out two more branches.
And I have had to learn to get past my instincts to let plants do what they will, allowing dead branches and leaves to fall when they will. Roses are different: hurt me, they scream. Show me that you have noticed that part of me has died, and I shall respond by shooting a cane into a direction you do not want, or possibly by sending up a tiny rose, or a huge rose. Hurt me, strip me.
It's an unhappy season for the bushes just now, the dry cool period when they ache for rain and warmth, and get little of either (although this has been a warmer January than usual.) But it might rain this afternoon, a little, and light clouds are moving in, so I headed out to do a little pruning. We shall see if a rose garden can rise out of this yet.**
*Virtually everyone who has seen pictures of this dog will be disputing my description here: Ami was a basenji and not by most standards particularly large or even cracking medium size, but she was big TO ME, so I'm sticking with my story.
** It would help if I could stop rolling over the miniature roses.
Not so much for the roses, although I love roses, but for the pure romance of the name. Rose garden. The sort of name that means fairies and dreams and magic. And because when I was very very small, we had one – a mess of roses in the tiny back yard that formed an impenetrable wall that whispered of the magic behind it, a wall watched by me and my doll Tina and our large dog* for magic or fairies or Muppets.
I never did get through those roses, even in winter when they slept.
Our later journeys were not conducive to rose gardening, although they did include visits to rose gardens throughout the world, some in great shape, some dying. Apartment living in South Florida was even worse, although I did buy the occasional bush or miniature roses just to watch them sag over and die. I had, you might say, a gift for it, and eventually decided to mostly stick to easier plants that said, yeah, yeah, so the sunlight wasn't exact or you forgot me for a couple days. I'm going to grow anyway.
When we came here, the front lawn had three rose bushes in decidedly awful shape, but one was pushing forward magnificent roses in pure defiance of the rest of its very dead state. We moved one bush (it was pretty much dying anyway) and I put coffee grounds on the others and brought in more rose bushes, including some miniature ones and hoped.
And learned that these roses can probably be best called mercurial.
One week, a bush is dying, miserable, drooping with a KILL ME NOW look; the next week, it's blooming. That bush in the very dead state when we arrived, that various people strongly suggested should be uprooted to end its misery? Is today the best and healthiest bush out there, without a single rose. Meanwhile, the most straggly bush is gleaming with the garden's single rose. Another rose, which I had given up on after it turned to a single stick, just pushed out two more branches.
And I have had to learn to get past my instincts to let plants do what they will, allowing dead branches and leaves to fall when they will. Roses are different: hurt me, they scream. Show me that you have noticed that part of me has died, and I shall respond by shooting a cane into a direction you do not want, or possibly by sending up a tiny rose, or a huge rose. Hurt me, strip me.
It's an unhappy season for the bushes just now, the dry cool period when they ache for rain and warmth, and get little of either (although this has been a warmer January than usual.) But it might rain this afternoon, a little, and light clouds are moving in, so I headed out to do a little pruning. We shall see if a rose garden can rise out of this yet.**
*Virtually everyone who has seen pictures of this dog will be disputing my description here: Ami was a basenji and not by most standards particularly large or even cracking medium size, but she was big TO ME, so I'm sticking with my story.
** It would help if I could stop rolling over the miniature roses.