Garden non-sequiturs

Just so we’re on the same page, here’s the definition for non-sequitur.

A conclusion or statement that does not logically follow

 from the previous argument or statement.

Gardening really amplifies my tendency to be illogical (though I will deny it to my dying day) or at least plagued by contradictory ideas. I can go on at a clip completely comfortable in the belief that my garden is set in stone except for minor tweaking. And then a photo here, an article there, and I’m off and running on a… Well, I refuse to use the word. I’ll only say tangent. Houses get this done to them once in a decade or two. Women seem to be getting really repetitive about it when it comes to their faces. But I refuse to keep going down this road with my garden. Will it never end?

Cydney (click it) started it by recommending Paul Zimmerman’s very good article on (click it) moving a mature rose bush. Excellent information that was totally irrelevant to my gardening life. Then she mentioned meeting a writer at the Garden Bloggers Fling in Ashville last week, Lynn Hunt, whose lovely gardening blog is called (click it) The Dirt Diaries. Somehow I had never heard of this blog, so I googled it and read her latest post about her long, long love affair with David Austin roses. That’s all it took. No earthquake, no brain transplant. Two simple, unrelated thoughts that have rocked my world.

Without consulting me, my brain made the instant decision to move ‘Bow Bells’ out of her shady place into the sunny place where ‘Enchantress’ now resides which would move ‘Enchantress’ to the curb. You see, ‘Bow Bells’ is an Austin rose who has been relegated to a rose dungeon, chained to the shade, deprived of her right to be who she is, a bloom machine. And ‘Enchantress’ is an Old Garden Rose, a Tea rose to be exact, to whom I have become very attached. This attachment began back when most of my roses wouldn’t keep leaves on their boney bodies. ‘Enchantress’ on the other hand was as evergreen as any azalea you’ve ever seen, a masterpiece in green. In response to rosarians’ comments that she balled and crisped excessively I sang merrily that I didn’t care about flowers at all. It was her leaves and her petite size with which I was in love. Don’t get me wrong, I would add quickly, I love her tiny, petal-packed magenta flowers, so rare for a Tea rose. There just weren’t that many of them that often. The balling and crisping didn't happen in my garden, so she was a winner for me. 

Alas, time has not been a friend to ‘Enchantress’. This spring the balling and crisping has seemed to be constant. Her size, though by no means large by Tea standards, is no longer petite, and this treacherous gardener has been casting hairy eyeballs her way more and more lately. I would urge myself to be reasonable. The front garden did not need another giant hole in it especially on the same side with the hole that ‘Bermuda’s Anna Olivier’ had left. So sit tight was my plea to myself. She’ll get over it when the heat arrives. It’ll be fine, just watch.



By rights I should not be allowed out of the little world I have made for myself in my little garden. Reading or hearing or lip-reading the ideas of others should not be allowed. They can only cause trouble since my applecart is already far too wobbly. But the milk has in fact been spilt. Perhaps I should look upon this monkey wrench as a blessing in disguise sent to rescue me from having to walk past ‘Enchantress’ with curled lip ever again. Yes, a garden should not be a place where unsatisfying plants continue for very long. There should only be pleasantness and satisfaction in the garden. (She's dreaming again.) It is nothing personal against this rose which in another garden could very well be exquisite, and at the same time it is very personal to this gardener’s peace of mind which is delicate to say the least. Neither is it anything to feel guilt over, though I do feel considerably guilty. Since vowing never to hastily pull out roses again, it is not a thing I do easily, just a bit too often. So maybe in the grand plan for my garden, the one that God alone has control over, maybe this is a step in the right direction along the same lines as omelets and broken eggs.

Maybe ‘Enchantress’ would be happier in a different spot… different than the curb, I mean. I do have a vacancy next to ‘Reve d’Or’ on the east side of the house that gets a bit of shade. Maybe she wouldn’t crisp so much in a less broiler-like location. She might even fit since she’s sort of oblong.

(Heavy sigh)

I think perhaps this semi-hysterical outpouring has given my peace of mind some peace of mind.

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Talk about non-sequiturs! A foxglove blooming in the June heat & humidity of Florida?

I'll interject  'Maman Cochet' into any conversation regardless of subject.

And 'Becky Lynn' photos come out like the proverbial pics of the grandkids, no matter how off topic.

I can't believe anyone wouldn't want to follow the progress of 'Full Moon Rising'.

Oh, by the way 'White Maman Cochet' was looking lovely yesterday.

Leave out 'Le Vesuve'? Nah.