re:tumbleweed
[email protected]
Hi,
I just looked over your baby tumbleweed shots, which brought back a memory I have. My brother was heading off to far away places and I was still home, probably 14. I begged him to bring me a tumbleweed, fully mature, tumbly type. He brought me 2 which I hung up in my room for about 6 months. Maybe a sign of the plantlover I was to become.
Mary
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
I just looked over your baby tumbleweed shots, which brought back a memory I have. My brother was heading off to far away places and I was still home, probably 14. I begged him to bring me a tumbleweed, fully mature, tumbly type. He brought me 2 which I hung up in my room for about 6 months. Maybe a sign of the plantlover I was to become.
Mary
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
[email protected]
-=-My brother was heading off to far away places and I was still home,
probably 14. I begged him to bring me a tumbleweed, fully mature, tumbly type. He
brought me 2 which I hung up in my room for about 6 months. Maybe a sign of
the plantlover I was to become.
-=-
That was generous and noble, because they're a pain to transport.
I've thought of bringing one to St. Louis as a show'n'tell, but it would
take as much room as a person in the van.
I've never thought of myself as a plant lover, really, but yesterday when I
was working on those pages I was getting more and more excited, and this
morning when I went to the post office to mail stuff, there was a new set of
37cent stamps on display, four different flowering bulbs, and we have ALL FOUR in
our yard. Very exciting. And in those colors, too--bearded iris purple
with yellow (which were in our yard when we bought the house, but they were
dormant and sad from nine years' neglect and now they're quite fat'n'happy) and
pink and white striped tulips (which didn't come up last year but did THIS and
surprised us; from a box of bulbs Keith won at Rowland's nursery for guessing
how many were in the box)...
So I was thinking, yesterday, about why I've pushed back my plant interest.
For many years it just didn't fit with my medieval music and art interests,
and we didn't have room at the old house for any indoor plants and it was all
we could do in the yard to get the stickers gone so the babies could play
barefooted.
But now I'm in a house I'll probably stay in for the rest of my life, and
the yard is bigger, and there are some deep windowsills, and we're not so poor
that to buy day lilly bulbs is totally out of the question (as we were for a
long time). I can afford potting soil (and we also have room for a big
compost pile). It makes a difference.
And when I was writing those pages I realized that it was school. School
kept me from thinking I had the right to mess with plants. I didn't like
biology. People don't go on to more particular studies without liking biology and
chemistry. You don't earn botany or genetics without being good at
chemistry.
My cousin, Nada (who grew up with me, shared a room until we were 14&15),
used to work at a greenhouse, but she also could keep houseplants alive for
years, so I thought she knew things I didn't know. She just stayed in bigger
houses longer, while I was moving from back room to temporary other place.
Years passed while I didn't think about whether I liked plants. I've grown
trees from seeds and saplings in that time, it's been so long. And hey, I
was growing trees!! Still didn't notice.
It's fun and funny when a big interest can be indwelling in someone for
years and they don't notice. I was like that about early music, when I was a
teen. I had totally compartmentalized my various musical interests, and not
until I graduated and went to tell my old teachers I was going to teach and
they'd all say "Music?" that it had occurred to me it might be something one
could study. No, I'd studied English and psychology and anthropology.
Within a few years I realized what I really liked was early music and
should've known from the hymns I liked at church, the ballads I liked when I played
guitar and sang, and the recorder I had learned and gotten pretty good at.
Kinda "duh" to other people, but I was so busy I hadn't noticed.
I guess I've been so busy since then I didn't notice I also like plants
Cool!
I don't think my kids will have this problem of thinking they need to have a
little resume and good grades to claim interest or knowledge.
Sandra
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
probably 14. I begged him to bring me a tumbleweed, fully mature, tumbly type. He
brought me 2 which I hung up in my room for about 6 months. Maybe a sign of
the plantlover I was to become.
-=-
That was generous and noble, because they're a pain to transport.
I've thought of bringing one to St. Louis as a show'n'tell, but it would
take as much room as a person in the van.
I've never thought of myself as a plant lover, really, but yesterday when I
was working on those pages I was getting more and more excited, and this
morning when I went to the post office to mail stuff, there was a new set of
37cent stamps on display, four different flowering bulbs, and we have ALL FOUR in
our yard. Very exciting. And in those colors, too--bearded iris purple
with yellow (which were in our yard when we bought the house, but they were
dormant and sad from nine years' neglect and now they're quite fat'n'happy) and
pink and white striped tulips (which didn't come up last year but did THIS and
surprised us; from a box of bulbs Keith won at Rowland's nursery for guessing
how many were in the box)...
So I was thinking, yesterday, about why I've pushed back my plant interest.
For many years it just didn't fit with my medieval music and art interests,
and we didn't have room at the old house for any indoor plants and it was all
we could do in the yard to get the stickers gone so the babies could play
barefooted.
But now I'm in a house I'll probably stay in for the rest of my life, and
the yard is bigger, and there are some deep windowsills, and we're not so poor
that to buy day lilly bulbs is totally out of the question (as we were for a
long time). I can afford potting soil (and we also have room for a big
compost pile). It makes a difference.
And when I was writing those pages I realized that it was school. School
kept me from thinking I had the right to mess with plants. I didn't like
biology. People don't go on to more particular studies without liking biology and
chemistry. You don't earn botany or genetics without being good at
chemistry.
My cousin, Nada (who grew up with me, shared a room until we were 14&15),
used to work at a greenhouse, but she also could keep houseplants alive for
years, so I thought she knew things I didn't know. She just stayed in bigger
houses longer, while I was moving from back room to temporary other place.
Years passed while I didn't think about whether I liked plants. I've grown
trees from seeds and saplings in that time, it's been so long. And hey, I
was growing trees!! Still didn't notice.
It's fun and funny when a big interest can be indwelling in someone for
years and they don't notice. I was like that about early music, when I was a
teen. I had totally compartmentalized my various musical interests, and not
until I graduated and went to tell my old teachers I was going to teach and
they'd all say "Music?" that it had occurred to me it might be something one
could study. No, I'd studied English and psychology and anthropology.
Within a few years I realized what I really liked was early music and
should've known from the hymns I liked at church, the ballads I liked when I played
guitar and sang, and the recorder I had learned and gotten pretty good at.
Kinda "duh" to other people, but I was so busy I hadn't noticed.
I guess I've been so busy since then I didn't notice I also like plants
Cool!
I don't think my kids will have this problem of thinking they need to have a
little resume and good grades to claim interest or knowledge.
Sandra
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]