How the seed got planted…
I let my winter garden grow wild as spring approached. I’ve never seen beets go to seed, or some of the mustard greens I had planted, and they were radiant in their flowered state, taller than I imagined they’d get and their tops tangled where the wind had blown them together. The dandelion greens were perhaps the most impressive of all, reaching far above my head.
My dear friend, Anne, had asked if I wanted some of the tomatoes she had started by seed for the summer, and since I did, I thought — gosh, I better get to clearing out these winter beds then.
We’re so lucky to live in this place, where you can shift your garden beds with the seasons and there’s not much time off between them to add fresh compost where the beds have compacted. Where I grew up the land relishes its long rest, going dormant in late fall and resolutely sleeping through the first alarms of spring. We plant there after Memorial Day when the winter has finally relented and the ground warmed enough to welcome new roots.
Clearing the beds I harvested some overgrown and no doubt reedy textured beets and let my three year old son gleefully chop down the dandelion greens. My daughters watched the honeybees gathered at the last of the blossoms. As I waded toward the back of my center bed I found a beautiful surprise. A volunteer sunflower already about three feet tall. A bird or squirrel must have knocked the seed into the bed from the nearby feeder and the protective cover of the flowering winter crops allowed it to flourish without another bird or squirrel digging it out as a tender shoot.
Sunflowers remind me of my maternal grandmother who always said they hold the energy of the sun. I remember bringing her an out of season bouquet from the grocery store in the dead of winter and her face lighting up as she said - “Oh! Trista! You’ve brought the sunshine in!” I don’t think I could have heard a better compliment from a woman who was always a ray of hope and respite for me. Seeing sunflowers now always makes me think of her, and her particular medicine: wise and steadfast, she showed me how joy and sorrow are two sides of the same coin, so close they touch. Her ability to find the light in the darkest situations and laughter through tears has always stayed with me. As has her unending curiosity.
This happy volunteer has inspired me to plant more sunflowers this year, many of them coming again from Anne. As they open their blossoms to the sun I see my grandmother in their faces.
Asia Suler
subtle energy & flower essences