When I arrived, Uncle Brian was furtling around in the compost heaps.
‘What are you doing?’
‘Potpourri potential.’
He was a man of few words.
‘I can’t imagine you will find anything fragrant there.’
‘Potpourri for insects, a quick way to attract all sorts of creatures when you are rewilding your garden.’
‘The customers who come to Grandma’s rose nursery are unlikely to be into rewilding are they?’
‘Sell on the internet, besides, roses are going.’
‘Going?’
‘Yup, going same way as your gran.’
He turned his head and nodded towards the Victorian brick tool shed, behind which smoke spiralled into the air. Now he had drawn my attention I noticed the divine scent of wood smoke and wandered in that direction. My grandmother, his mother, had requested she be cremated and her ashes placed in her favourite rose bed, but the cremation was not taking place till next week. I tiptoed round into the yard to be confronted by a tangle of burning rose wood.
‘Has there been some kind of rose disease?’
I did not know much about Grandma’s beloved roses, but I knew she inspected every leaf and petal for signs of spottling.
‘No, told you, roses are going, getting a rotavator in, then let the grass grow, the seeds blow and the weeds return.’
It was the longest speech he had ever made.
‘Does Mum know what you are doing?’
‘Nope, doesn’t need to, this was left to me.’
It was true that Brian had been the one who lived and worked here and frankly we assumed Grandma left the nursery and house to him as the prospect of him working or living elsewhere was unlikely.
A few weeks later we took Grandma’s ashes with us to the Chelsea Flower Show where she had had many successes with her prize roses. We met up with her good friend Gerald, a Chelsea Pensioner who had a red rose named after him. He was wearing a ‘Captain Gerald’ rose bud in his button hole and took us to a quiet spot in a rose garden where the Pensioners liked to sit and where three of his rose bushes took pride of place. No one was around so we quickly interred the ashes in the bed and left Gerald to his memories.
A few more weeks passed and we hadn’t heard much from Uncle Brian, but that wasn’t unusual. Mum thought we should pay a duty visit soon. That evening we sat down to watch Gardeners’ World, commenting on roses that weren’t as wonderful as Grandma’s.
‘Actually, I never really liked roses in the garden,’ said Mum ‘all that trouble and most of the year they are prickly skeletons. But birthdays, Xmas, new babies what did I always get? Another rose; climbers, ramblers, patio pots, bushes, old classics, new varieties named after us….’
‘How come we have so few in the garden then?’
‘I don’t think roses liked me, they never thrived and often died. Brian had the right idea.’
As if he had heard her the presenter moved on to the next segment.
‘While many people treasure their roses, others feel the need for a change. We visit a former rose nursery in Surrey where all the roses have been dug up and the whole area rewilded. Brian Floribunda has just been recognised as holding the national collection of dandelions.’
There was Uncle Brian standing amongst waist high grass surrounded by tall dandelions waving in the breeze.
‘How long did it take you to establish this wonderful collection?’
‘Few weeks, they pop up everywhere given the chance, quick turn around, not long to breed new varieties.’
‘How many varieties are there?’
‘Fifty Seven so far, just working on creating a blue dandelion.’
‘That sounds incredible or impossible.’
‘Not as difficult as producing a true black… got to get on…’
Uncle Brian turned away and the presenter was unable to get any more conversation out of him. The camera panned round the Field of Gold.
‘Grandma must be turning in her rose bed’ I said.
‘Especially as she never managed to appear on Gardeners World’ said Mum.
