PLANTING AND TRANSPLANTING

Most of my gardening, these days, involves using planters and baskets in my yard or on my deck. Though I lack many skills, I do enjoy germinating seeds or potting vegetables. It makes me smile.

This weekend I was at a Lowe's gardening center, looking for a Mother's Day gift. While there, I remembered a couple of pots for the front yard that needed to be filled. On a budget, I thought I would look at some of the discounted trays of plants. The tray had starter plants that looked wilted, with lifeless leaves and sagging petals. If the trays weren't labeled, I wouldn't have recognized the flowers. However, for $.50 a tray, if only a few plants survived, I would be ahead of the game.

Rather than fill 2 flower pots, I ended up with 4 pots of flowers, and I also had marigolds to plant around my tomatoes to ward off insects.  Though I carefully put the plants into the soil, petals still fell off into my hands. Even more fell as I watered the soil. A few plants had no more than root and nubs of stems left. I wondered how many plants would make it through the night.

To my surprise, the next morning the begonias, inpatients, and even the marigolds looked refreshed and full. By the next day, even the nubby plants were showing new growth. My $2.00 worth of flower trays filled over 4 flower pots and each pot had flowers that are all ready blooming.

All the flowers needed was a new, healthy environment to flourish.

It makes me smile.

I've often felt like those flowers. I want to grow and flourish, but I've stumbled into an unhealthy environment where I seem to only wilt. As difficult as it was, I've had to change my environment. Though the changes difficult, the results health wise--and mental health wise--were worth it. I've even had doctors say they could tell, from one check-up to the next, that I had done something drastic which improved my health. The change was completely environmental.

 We are like flowers. We need the right environment in which to grow.