It's very hard to keep a rose alive inside, I think it's more lack of sun than anything else, really. I'm impressed that you kept it alive for a couple of months!

I figure the leaves are free and not attractive to people who might want to steal or break things. I go and gather them from the piles our city encourages people to rake into the street so they can gather and remove them easily. In the spring, they get dug into the ground in garden spots or turned into the compost pile.