This afternoon I went to work to bring 'Blanc de Vibert' within bounds. It was caged, but escaped one windy night, and since the rose is roughly 10' x 12', the dense fallen mass of canes, foliage, and buds blocked the back corner of the garden. This is at the back of the propagating beds close to the house, not in some distant corner of the garden, but chaos can arrive in civilized and cultivated parts, too. Well... civilized. I haven't been keeping up with the propagating beds, and they're overgrown with thriving meadow grass, which I've been cutting back and pulling. Some of the grass goes on the paths, some on the beds, some, I put under the pavers, figuring the ground there can stand improvement, too; and it allows me to remove the bindweed roots coiling below. I stopped for a while after dropping the sharp edge of a fifty pound paver on my sandaled toe. Today, though, I wore actual shoes. We have one bed with tomatoes and parsley; and roses, peonies, figs, Alexandrian laurel, and columnar yews growing in others for planting out later.

'Blanc de Vibert' has a reputation for being temparamental: it has never bloomed well for me, setting abundant buds but not opening them. The plant is thriving as can be. It's in a dark corner, and I've always hoped that if it ever got up to the sun it might bloom better. Hauling it up and fixing a horizontal piece of wood as a barrier was really hard, the rose being so heavy, though thank goodness not much given to thorns. I can now go past it, somewhat bent, and was able to clean the paved path it had fallen on. And finally, for the first time this year, I came face to face with the magnificent, splendid, glorious 'De la Maitre-Ecole'. If your climate allows, grow it: there is no more--I used up all the adjectives: refer back--rose. Mine is about six feet tall, this with a substantial fall pruning. It was planted in 2004. On HMF Maddalena Piccinini's photos give a good idea.

Cleaning and bringing some order to the propagating beds (this name refers to the beds themselves and to the smallish garden that wraps around them) was psychologically as well as aesthetically satisfying. There are some nice plants back there. I love my yellow-variegated privet, grown to a good-sized shrub. I know it's not fashionable to love privet, but in spring and early summer, when this shrub is covered in bright sunny yellow and light green, it's the most cheerful plant in the garden, and yet it has substance and a respectable air: really inspiring. Most of these plants are old friends. 'Great Maiden's Blush' in another corner, which has suckered out over time parallel to the grass path and which I hope to see a massive wall of rose one day, and the extension to the vigorous hedge of Alexandrian laurel, which will give the garden more coherence when the young plants get some size. The green wall in the back which blocks the somewhat unsightly view of the neighbors' property: yew, box, bay laurel, a variegated holly that may even grow, one day. The bed totally taken over by 'Tuscany', with only a peony fighting to keep a foothold. On the side bounded by a building, the two climbing roses on a pergola over the paved path, 'Cl. Papa Gontier' (I have doubts as to this ID) and 'Crepuscule', with underneath agapanthus, persicaria, and variegated Japanese iris: plants that light up shade and are cool toned in summer heat. A few peonies and hellebores here and there, a patch of woods on the downhill side. I still have remarkable amounts of grass to bring under control, but at least I can get in now. I do love this garden, mature, occasionally orderly, so friendly, so pleasant.