Roses

The previous owner of our house loved roses. Of this there is no doubt. The garden is full of them. In addition to a dedicated rose bed at the near end (the one I complained about here), there are rose bushes spread all around the garden.

As I have said before, I am not a great fan of roses. I like white ones. I like red ones (although maybe more in a vase than in the garden). I do not like pink, orange, or yellow ones. And that is what there were in this garden when we saw it as prospective buyers last summer.

Now summer has come again (of sorts) and the roses are in bloom and I have to admit I might have changed my mind about them. Just a bit. The pastel coloured roses that I remember disliking so much last summer are currently looking and smelling so beautiful that I am thinking I might not dig them all up after all.

Don’t get me wrong, I will dig some of them up. An entire bed devoted to roses is, I think, far too much in a garden this size, especially when this bed is the only one in full sun.

And there are some roses that make it really easy for me to get out my spade:

Pink. Ugh. Like so much else in this garden. Ugh.

You might think, then, that planting a new rose in a garden so full of roses, especially when I have admitted that I am not their biggest fan, may seem an odd thing to do. Nonetheless I have done it. And for very good reason.

Here are the first flowers of our ‘Bobbie James’ rose, a housewarming gift from my in-laws.

Planted in place of the Euphorbia, underneath the Magnolia, this is the kind of rose I really really like. A rambler with small, simple, fragrant white flowers, that hopefully, in years to come, will grow up through the Magnolia, breaking up the green and brightening the tree throughout the summer. I can’t wait.