I believe that Barbara has given up on her once determined effort to maintain unobstructed paths through the garden, though I fear this report might reawaken my wife’s crusade. It is possible, though unlikely, that she has grown to enjoy the rambunctious overflow onto the paths.. Instead, I think she has given up, knowing that I will plant another sprawler to thwart her effort.

Of course, paths are constructed to enable travel through the garden. This garden’s stone paths are narrow even without sprawling crested irises (Iris cristata) and hostas slowing the pace, and further complicated by low overhead branches of Japanese maples and hornbeam.

The hornbeam (Carpinus betulus ‘Pendula’, below) tunnel obscures the lower rear garden so that visitors suspect this to be the garden’s terminal border. No, it goes beyond, beneath the pendulous branches that require annual pruning and that become nearly impassable when rain soaked branches arch lower and soak those who dare to pass beneath.

Garden design concepts encourage twists and turns to slow the pace to enjoy views, and certainly I have mastered this, though my intent has been only to add another plant.