A Vexation

 Things are coming along nicely in my tiny southwest gardens. I've settled on the look I want, I'm having some successes and eliminating inevitable failures. I like the way it's turning out and our upcoming fourth spring here holds promise.

Except for the vexation that is outside my kitchen door. This garden -- the only one that gets mostly sun and the one I pass coming and going daily -- does not know what it wants to be. Neither do I. 

When we moved in it looked like this: overgrown shrubs and scraggly roses up against the fence. We took out the shrubs and roses and plopped the bbq grill there. But that didn't do much for this little courtyard.

The first year we cleaned out the overgrown shrubs and put the grill there

So the next year we moved the grill out of the way and I raked out the gravel and put in soil for a real garden and it looked like this:

The second year I made an actual garden and put a pot and some
annuals in after most of my perennials failed

I was going for a sunny flower garden. I had added easy care, locally bought, sun loving perennial flowers that do well in Santa Fe, and every single one shrank and died a withering death in 12 days. I tried more things and they failed to grow. 

I took out all the soil, thinking I may have bought toxic bagged compost originally. I bought new compost and soil and I planted different perennials and some bulbs and either nothing came up or what did grow started out small and grew smaller. Finally I put in annuals and a pot.

This past summer, the third year, I did get clumps of things to not die, but this is not what I envisioned by the kitchen door.

Last summer purple veronicas flowered, but then diminished in size.
The vine set buds but bud blast shattered them before opening.

The Kintzley's Ghost vine in the center grew, but bud blast shriveled the flowers, and nothing bloomed. The stiff purple veronicas flowered, but each clump of foliage got smaller over the summer. The yellow pompoms of sulphur buckwheat in front of the vine were really cute, but the plant disappeared by the end of summer and nothing is left now.

This space does not want to be a flower garden. But what does this courtyard want to be?

A water feature garden? I could remove the plants and put river rocks about and plop an urn -- maybe even a water bubbler -- in the middle. Too Mediterranean?

A rock garden? I could fill the area with big rocks, add a pot, maybe put in a few alpine or succulent plants whose appeal is that they are in fact supposed to look stunted, and call it intentional. Too "I give up"?

A pot garden? I could arrange a dozen containers closely grouped together. Some easy petunias, pansies and some herbs in garden pots. Too junky? 

A contemplation space? Put the gravel back, and set a bench there, nothing else. Simple and spare and zen. Too empty?

What does a tiny curved garden in a fenced-in flagstone courtyard between a gate and a kitchen door want to be? 

Why has everything failed here? Why has even imagination failed me? Where is the inspiration? Who's going to replant or re-do all of this?

I am seriously vexed.