Today is the first Saturday of May. For many years it has been the traditional date of the Run for the Roses, better known as The Kentucky Derby. Like most scheduled events, this horse race has been postponed until a later date. I’ll settle for listening to the Dan Fogelberg song, “Run for the Roses.”

So many things are being postponed! It looks like our late summer and fall schedules will be packed with things that must be delayed due to Covid-19. That domino effect may push other things into next year’s calendar. How can we work it all in?

There’s a saying in Recovery circles that if you don’t mind the inches, you’ll find yourself a mile off course. I find this to be true in gardening as well. When I neglect an area for a little while, or when I turn my focus to other matters for too long, I let other things get out of hand. If we’re honest, it can be true about most important issues of life: marriage and other relationships, finances, work, home maintenence, and spiritual things too.

The picture above is an area I’ve neglected for quite a while. I don’t go to that part of the yard with my garden tools often, since it’s accessed by a heavy wooden gate that’s becoming rickety. The vinca major (perennial periwinkle) has taken over, along with blackberry vines. Oaks, sweetgum, and privet are growing in spaces much too tight to accomodate them.

You can’t even see the rose bush in the middle space because of the privet shrub. However, if you look closely, you can see those miniature Red Cascade roses, determined to fight for their place on the fence row. They are what you see in the top picture of this post.

So, yesterday, I started my project to recover the rose bush. It required surgical precision to eliminate the privet without damaging the roses too much.

I dug the interlopers out by the roots. I took a garden rake and shovel to the vines and pulled them out by the handfulls with double gloves.

The vinca was one of those, “it seemed like a good idea at the time” things. Aunt Mary had it in her yard and claimed to love its early spring purple flowers. I brought some home years ago and will probably never rid the garden of it completely. Those flowers are hardly worth the trouble.

After finding them, I tied up the runners of this rose to the trellis, since it’s considered a climber or ground cover type.

The middle section of this bed was all I could handle Friday morning, but I met my goal of freeing this rose bush from being strangled by the weeds. I’ll get the right and left sides next week, and I can’t postpone it.

After all, I have plans for what to plant next in this sunny spot to compliment the roses.

Have a good week, my friends, as you enjoy May’s beautiful weather. The Lord bless and keep you.

Shalom, Dottie

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