Lilies, Grasses, and Sedum

As a lover of apples on a mission to share them, Johnny Appleseed focused on planting apple trees.  Period.  No doubt he would freak out if he could see all the plant varieties including, but far surpassing, the fruit trees that were readily available at our local Menard’s yesterday.  I found the countless sub-varieties of almost everything overwhelming - the plant breeders’ species (hybrids and mutants and dwarves) – as they stood in their rows and ranks in clusters-on-top-of-clusters.   Colorful flowered troops of annuals, actually desperate orphans, lined the aisles upon aisles, waiting for eager gardeners to take them home and nurture them as their own.

I tried to focus … FOCUS … in the midst of the heady sensory overload.  I wasn’t shopping for something major like trees – just small landscape flowers for a couple of spots on either side of the pier down by the lake.  But I was surrounded by so many confusing colors and scents and sizes and OPTIONS! I finally forced myself to … dare … to … choose … something.  To go with my gut and just pick SOMETHING.  It was not a very rational process, but rather subliminal urgings came to the fore and took over the selection process. 

I went home with day lilies, ornamental grasses, and sedum.

Hours later I realized the significance of my choices.  During the 1950’s, when life was simpler and more predictable, profuse orange day lilies grew wild along the country road surrounded by tall, waving grasses.  Sedum dripped from crude window boxes nailed to our lake cottage’s screened-in porch.  I was deeply shaped by icons like these and the qualities they represented.

In like manner, what do my current choices reflect?

Yellow lilies with blazing red centers?  BEAUTY. Loose grasses tipped in red, and thin bluish leaves that bob playfully in the breeze?  FREEDOM.  Sedum, the ground cover that even as I child I realized would thrive in even the worst possible conditions?  TENACITY.

After making my selections it was surprising, and yet also gratifying, to realize how my own early roots remain firm as I continue to transplant a legacy.  Those roots will continue to ground, and encourage, children and grandchildren – future torch-bearers of the same tangible reminders that taught me what it means to hope.