Oh, the lessons I should’ve learned. When is enough, enough? Though there are only a few neglected roses in the garden, when is the time to stop and smell them?

Instead, even after thirty-five years, it’s full speed ahead. Certainly, I’m planting fewer trees as the garden overflows, but there’s hardly a week without a visit to the garden center or a box or two being delivered of some oddball that I’d never heard of until the moment it caught my eye.

The latest obsession is a columnar Chinese dogwood, ‘Snow Tower’ (Cornus kousa ‘Snow Tower’). There’s a spot in the lower rear garden where a redbud perished in last year’s drought, so in spring, I planted a nice red leafed Japanese maple with deeply cut leaves. I’ve walked past it a few hundred times now, and on each pass, I’m less satisfied. The maple is fine. It just doesn’t work in this location. It won’t grow large enough, soon enough, so it’s got to go.

But, there are complications, mostly limited space, and that’s why the Japanese maple was selected. Of course, there’s another answer, one that I’ve used several times for similar situations in recent years. Columnar, but it must be a tree with a true, narrow columnar form, not the columnar hornbeams I once planted that filled into broad ovals over time. And somehow, I landed on ‘Snow Tower’ that will grow to fifteen feet in height and only four feet in width. Perfect.

I’m pleased that after a frantic search, one was located. Not as large as I’d prefer, but it’ll grow. Quickly, I hope. The Japanese maple will be dug and potted for now. Some place will open for it to be squeezed in, but it will work in a container on one of the patios while that’s figured out.

So, I’m overjoyed. A minor bother has been resolved. Today, I envision the narrow dogwood in flower, standing tall between three nearby Japanese maples. Fortunately, most areas of this decades old garden are splendidly mature, but I’m thrilled by this newly found treasure.