Wednesday, July 19, 2006

The Lily That Ate Bridlemile


The thing is, I really love lillies. We have a bunch of them scattered around the house - at least a dozen out front and three or four in the back yard. They've been planted randomly, it seems, and it's been interesting watching them grow.

There's one in particular that's planted near our front deck and captured our attention a month or so ago when it grew to about seven feet high. I had fantasies of waking one morning to discover that the house had been commandeered by a talking, walking lily plant giving orders about filling the living room with potting soil so it could reproduce in relative comfort. It finally stopped getting taller and began to produce buds (BIG buds), and it took several more weeks for those buds to open. But when they did, all that waiting was well worth it -- it produced the most gorgeous, white lillies I'd ever seen.

So a few days ago, I cut off a couple of stems and put them in a vase on the sideboard in our dining room. And suddenly I remembered why I used to hate getting floral arrangements with lillies in them -- I'm ALLERGIC to the pollen! After a day of itchy eyes, constant snuffling and general allergy-related misery, David took the vase and put it out on the back deck.

I've learned my lesson. Enjoy the lillies in their natural habitat.

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