Morning Glory

I like vines.  I always have.  I believe that maybe I identify with them.  I fill my gardens with many types of vines…pumpkins, hyacinth bean, nasturtiums, passion flowers, moonflowers, trumpet, honeysuckle, mandevilla, morning glories…because I like watching their curly tendrils grow; stretching, entwining in all directions, wild, strong and free.  I think I’m drawn to them like the beetles, bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds I see flirt with them.  I can’t ever know the brilliant blossoms as the soft and smooth, iridescent, humming-winged companions do, so I stand from afar and I admire all the colors, the shapes, and the music that awaken my green soul.  I know I’m in love with their resilience, holding tight to the summer sun’s warm embrace, even in autumn’s early frosted Dawn.  And I love when after a breaking winter, my eye’s behold a spring sprout, pushing up through the dirt, reacquainting itself with the friendly, faded fence that has been waiting months for its companion to return. 

I had a stubborn morning glory this season.  It was a late bloomer that refused to blossom, and when it finally did, I would get one blossom, every two or three days.  I refused to give up hope and I comfortably settled in my patience, but I also understood that sometimes you can’t force a reaction, no matter how much love tends to its needs.  So I backed off, watching, waiting from my kitchen window…every day sending it positive thoughts and hopes from my green heart…grow, strengthen, blossom, believe you can flourish even as the seasons change.  This morning…this frosted October morning…I walked to the kitchen window, as I do every morning, and I beheld stunning azure blossoms, unfurling and trumpeting to the Autumn blue sky, matching hue for hue, my eyes unsure where heavenly silken petal met heavenly silken sky.  There are several more spiral sealed buds that look like buttoned up umbrellas, just waiting for tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow…and perhaps each day I will carefully approach the vine, closer and closer with each new morning, until one day I can admire the beauty from up close, extending my small green hand to a triumphant blossom, and quietly introduce myself with a soft, rosy smile and a softly whispered, “Hello, old friend.”

E.A. O'Connell