"The Calla Lillies are in Bloom Again"

Kathryn Hepburn said that in Stage Door Canteen. A great film and a quote that has stuck with me for many years. This is one of those plants that takes on a life and a meaning of it's own. It is still a shadow of it's former glory but like the rest of us, it is slowly coming back. Originally this plant belonged to my mother, it grew outside her front door and every year it bloomed a hundred gorgeous large blooms. Three feet in diameter and taller than me it was glorious. Right before we put her house on the market and shortly before she lost consciousness for the last time I asked her of there was anything in the garden that she wanted to keep. This was the only plant she wanted. While she was still in the ICU Patrick and John drove out to her house and dug this one up, put it in a too small pot and drove it the two hours back to our house. It was bedraggled and broken and in bad shape. Still it lived for over a year in that tiny pot while we tried to keep going with our lives. I would look out the kitchen window and think, I have got to get that in the ground...and then something else would happen and I wouldn't get done. Finally when we moved I re potted it into a nice roomy pot and put it in a sunny spot in the back yard. It managed a few leaves, but no blooms. It was weak and slightly grey just hanging on. Like the rest of us. The deaths of two parents, the birth of a new baby, his illness, selling a house, buying a house and moving had left us all a little short of full bloom. Then winter came and we had a killing freeze, I moved the lilly into the garage and wrapped it in towels and burlap. It was frozen solid, when it thawed the visible roots (corms?) were mush. I was sure it was dead. Then spring came along and it sent up a few tentative shoots, then leaves and then this week, blooms. Two glorious, creamy white lillies. The first blooms since my mother died. For me it a clear signal that we are all getting just a little better every day, the sun shines more often, we laugh a little easier and our boys are growing strong. It seems foolish to imbue such meaning on a plant. But there it is, blooming in the garden growing stronger. Waking up each morning to face the sun, or sometimes the rain.