Shamrock Surprise

(A journal entry from February 24, 2019)

‍ ‍

Three weeks ago, my wife Mary Ann was watering our indoor plants when she noticed that our shamrock plant was in distress. It had outgrown the pot it was in, so she decided to take it out and repot it into a larger one.

But when she tried to extract the plant, she couldn't do it without damaging it. The roots were in a tangle and clinging tightly to the sides of the pot. She asked for my help, and even with me holding down the pot and her pulling up the plant, the root system broke apart, and shamrocks flew all over the place. Now what? we thought. Did we kill it?

Mary Ann wondered if it was her fault—and if she shouldn't have tried to transplant it. This hearty little shamrock plant was a favorite of ours, and I reassured her that it would be all right (I hoped). Our slapstick dive into the Irish greenery continued. We decided to repot the two broken parts into separate pots and see if they would keep growing.

Nature’s Resilience

Mary Ann carefully repotted them, making sure there was plenty of rich new soil, water, and fertilizer. Several shamrocks survived the transplant in one pot, none in the other. After a day or so, only one shamrock was left standing. Things looked bleak for our little friend, so we offered up a little prayer.

‍One more day and Mary Ann caught our cat chewing on the still remaining shamrock. Instead of three leaves, it was now down to one. Then we noticed a single leaf appeared like an arrow pointing to the light. We felt a little better, that maybe it just needed more light, away from the cat. Light and divine intervention.

And then, the lone surviving shamrock wilted.

But then we looked a little closer into the pots. There were several new shoots popping up! A fresh start for our determined little shamrocks. We hoped for full pots of green, leafy shamrocks in time for St. Patrick's Day, our daughter Erin's birthday. She loves our shamrocks too.

Lucky New Beginnings

And now, it's not even March yet, and the shamrocks are growing tall, green, and plentiful in both pots. There are even four tiny white flowers among them! The apparent replanting disaster turned out to be exactly what was needed for our shamrocks to thrive in new and bigger pots.

            A shamrock surprise, and perhaps a life lesson learned:

  Sometimes plants (and their caretakers) need more room, a little time, and some nourishing love to survive and thrive.

‍ ‍

🌊📜Your Message in a Bottle:

What about you? Has an apparent disaster ever given you more room to grow?