Rosa 'Ebb Tide' - 18 June 2018

Dechronization of Wild Edric

As a child my mother would often say in my presence, “Hay poca gente fina como nosotros.” By this she meant that few people at the time in Buenos Aires had her exquisite taste, elegance and manners. She was a snob.

Thus I had all the elements of becoming one. And so I became a snob.

Here in Vancouver while working for Vancouver Magazine with my In One Ear ( a monthly column or rock music) cohort Les Wiseman, he told me, “You must like Lou Reed and if you are going to listen to heavy metal it has to be Motorhead.” Wiseman was a snob.

When my wife and I began to garden in our corner garden in Kerrisdale in 1986 the colour of flowers had to be white or blue. She had a predilection for gray plants which were difficult to water (only under the leaves). Rosemary was (and is) a snob.

I became a garden snob, too.

One day Rosemary came home to tell me that the hydro wires had been cut at a house on Cartier. At the time many houses were being torn down. This was around the late 80s and early 90s. So with wheelbarrow and spade, in the dark of night we liberated some plants. One was a healthy rose. To Rosemary’s horror, when it bloomed (we gave it the name of Rosa ‘Cartier’) it was (for me) a lovely, blowsy but lurid red/orange. Eventually Rosemary tolerated the rose. 

One day Select Roses man, Brad Jalbert came for a visit and upon seeing the orange rose he said, “Alex I never expected to see Rosa ‘Allthat Jazz’ here." Not much later Jalbert persuaded me to purchase Rosa ‘Westerland’ an orange floribunda.

This floriferous climber with the scent of synthetic apricot jam grew on Rosemary. From orange we then absorbed yellow, too. It was the sight of Rosa ‘Mrs. Oakley Fisher’ in Janet Wood’s garden. This yellow rose is a tea rose. Since it is not a tea rose this was a plus for Rosemary.

But with the exception of Rosa ‘Westerland’ our garden then and now has nothing but English Roses, species roses and Old Garden Roses. There are none of those “questionable” floribundas.

But it was last week that at Garden Works I spotted an deep maroon rose that was very fragrant. It was Weeks Rose Rosa ‘Ebb Tide’. It seems that this rose had been for sale at the UBC Shop in the Garden where Rosemary works on Wednesdays. When I showed Rosemary the rose she told me that she had instantly liked it and that she had been afraid to mention its existence!

Until I saw Ebb Tide, Weeks Roses was to me an absolute no-no for anybody with my mother’s (and my) class.

I have to admit now that I have pleasantly downgraded myself!