Flowers as Characters

“Numenius, you know you don’t like pelargoniums? Well, I feel the same way about mallows.”

We were walking at the Tilden Bot Garden on Saturday in the rain which N. insisted was heavy mist.

“The ones I don’t like are Alstromeria,” said Joe. “They’re cheap. They’re the Britney Spears of flowers.”

At left is an alstromeria drawn by my niece when she was seven and sent to me. Since I don’t get many drawings from my sister’s kids, this one has been on my wall since. But I see Joe’s point: they have the aesthetic best suited to little girls heavily into anything pink and delicate (which T. no longer is, spending hours and hours these days hanging around the horse barn).

I had hoped the black-and-white columbine Ron gave us to plant last fall would have flowered by the time we left for columbine country (Colorado) tomorrow, but you’ll have to wait for a drawing of that one for when we get back in ten days. Aquilegea hybrid, var. Magpie.