Accepting Miracles

The title is the subject for ProfessorRoush today, a meme on my mind for all this past week.   My week of miracles started a week ago on a warm Saturday as I was engaged in lots of late Fall work in the yard, mowing, trimming, bushhogging, putting up hoses, and fully engaged in the activities I lump into "Fall cleanup."  My first glimpse of the miracles to come was this late crocus, Colchicum autumnale, a single, annually reoccurring survivor of the few toxic bulbs of the species that I planted years ago and long forgot.   Old age and fading memories sometimes provide unexpected benefits to old gardeners beyond our creaky knees and grumpy exteriors. 

And then, the same day, sitting down outside with Mrs. ProfessorRoush while we chatted with our grandsons, I spied this little sprig of life, a baby juniper bravely growing in the middle of a clump of River Birch, shaded from the sunlight it so desperately wants but also kept moistened and protected in the embrace of the birch.   Can't see the miracle for the tree?   Look closer!

If I left it here, to grow in the rotting organic debris gathered in the birch clump center, will it survive?   Choke out the birch?   Wither eventually, starved for light?   The young scientist in my mind still wants to know so I'm going to leave it growing here in the true sense of "letting nature take its course" while I observe.   A good gardener should always know when to accept miracles when miracles appear.

The sun and earth also conspired in the parade of miracles this week to give me these views of home and prairie as I came home late Tuesday.   Sometimes the light on this corner of the globe overwhelms me, although perhaps poorly captured in these photographs, as it did on this day.   The right angle, the right moment, and the grasses and trees and house were all shining left and right of me as I opened the mailbox and I just couldn't let the miracle moment go uncaptured.

Thursday, another miracle presented to Mrs. ProfessorRoush and I as we came home from supper, a moment of marriage so like many others until we pulled onto the garage pad and I noticed this unexpected bit of Spring transported to Fall, a blooming sprig of common lilac, isolated and alone among a dry and beaten hedge, but full of fragrance and hope for the next Spring to come.  I robbed the bees by taking it indoors where, for a few days, I could smell lilac before it faded into time again.

And was Saturday again, a Saturday like so many others but as welcome as rain on the prairie after a summer of drought.   My Saturdays are miracles every week, miracles brought by a dog wanting only love and a little game of frisbee to break up its long days of napping.  Bella has lots of gray now on her muzzle but her soul is still that of a puppy and her love waits only for me.   I'm convinced this dog counts the days of the week, knowing when it is Saturday and our weekly drive to McDonald's occurs and that I'll stay home and play instead of disappearing until darkness.   This last miracle, Bella in my life, is one I treasure every day, a daily reminder of all the beauty and love and happiness that the world can hold.

Forgotten Surprises

If there are, perhaps, any blessings at all to old age and fading memory, one must consider that life is often lightened by the sudden reminders of lost memories.  I had such a moment yesterday, during my "First Frost Chores" day, when the Crocus sp. pictured here decided to jump up and down to capture my attention.  What a delightful surprise to find such an elfin white beauty peeping up from among the columbines, just as one is mourning the loss of so many of summer's flowers.  On a Gulliver to Lilliput level, that bright orange pollen sprinkled on the translucent white background leaves me spellbound.




I hadn't the slightest idea where I obtained these, when I planted them, or how long they'd been there beyond a vague recollection of thinking they would be a nice addition to my autumn garden.  They are not native in Kansas, however, so I'm choosing to blame my memory rather than proclaim a botanical miracle.    In fact, when I first saw them, Crocus autumnale leapt into my mind as the most likely identification, probably because of the connection of autumn and autumnale within my rudimentary garden-gained Latin.  I knew of another autumn blooming crocus, Crocus sativus, but I was betting on ProfessorRoush's scientific peculiarities, and I felt that I would have been more likely to plant C. autumnale, the source of the poly-ploid-inducing botanical agent colchicine, rather than C. sativus, the source of cooking saffron.  In other words, my curious mind would likely chose a mutative toxin over a cooking spice for my garden.   I was thinking, of course, of how fun it would be to make a few of my own tetraploid daylilies.

This episode proves, however, why you should keep good garden records and why the mysteries of senior memory loss are so frustrating.  While I have no trouble recalling the scientific names and blooming characteristics of a pair of obscure autumn-blooming crocuses, I was wrong on both counts and my written notes inform me that I planted Crocus speciosus at these exact spots in 2004.  C. speciosus is a light lilac crocus native to Turkey that does, in fact, match the appearance of these delicately veined blooms better than the fictitious crocuses of my memory.  This light specimen is probably the white cultivar 'Albus'.   The Latin, speciosus, means "showy" or "beautiful", and yes, I suppose it is. 

Somewhere in the back of my mind, and contrary to my written notes, I still have an inkling that there are a few pink C. autumnale planted at the west corner of my house.  They may have been shaded out by larger surrounding plants, but I'm going to look for them soon, if only to prove to myself that my memory isn't totally slipping into oblivion.  On the other hand, if these are the surprises that my fifth decade brings, then I'm really looking forward to my nineties when the minute-to-minute astonishments of discovering again the existence of airplanes, computers, and television will really keep things exciting.