In mid-May in our garden there is always that excitement of plants that begin to Bloom. This is the case with our 40 roses that somehow fit in our small Kitsilano garden. Then two weeks ago most of those roses were gloriously in bloom.

Now most that may read this blog know that there are really three kind of roses. There are those mostly old roses of the 19^th century and beyond that may bloom once. These we call non-remontant roses. There are others that in late fall come back with a few flowers before they wave goodbye.

Modern roses including the English Roses that resemble old roses are remontant. This means that they flower freely during the summer all the way to the fall (but sometimes sporadically).

In order to help those remontant roses one has to deadhead the old blooms. This way the rose does not spend energy converting them to hips.

But it is truly a sad occasion when one cuts the roses of a rose like this Gallica, Rosa ‘James Mason’. What you see here are the last two flowers. And so James Mason bids us goodbye until the next year. 

After it blooms sometime in early fall I must prune the bush to size as I cannot allow plants to be too big in our constrained-for-space garden.

I am sad. At the very least this blog and scans of James Mason from other years can reside in my memory and I can begin to feel that hope that all gardens are of renewal in an immediate future.

Roses in spite of being difficult (so do some people say) are for me something in this world of changes that somehow gives me a stability to soldier on.