The Return of Pluck

“How are you this morning?” I asked my ninety-six-year-old mom about a month ago.

She barely looked at me.

“Weary and worn on the pathway below,” she said.

And without a smile.

But not anymore. Her neck still hurts. And her hands. Her steps are still slowing. And her memory fading. But she’s got her pluck back. Spring is here.

So I took her to London Florist the other day. For a week before our outing, she pored over a photo album, one that showed her flowerbeds of past years. One summer, she won the Prettiest Porch Award in our town. Not because she applied, but because someone drove by, took a photo of her porch, and submitted it.

But now the beds around her porch have been modified. After she broke her foot while gardening, we convinced her to reach out for help.

And so her grandson, who studies landscape architecture, redesigned the beds for a college project. He filled them with flowering shrubs and blue holly and perennials, aiming to make them beautiful. And low maintenance.

But he left her two beds—a narrow plot along the driveway and one set apart by a semicircle of rocks—which is why we went to London, Florist, where she was treated like a queen.

“Come with me, ma’am,” said the owner, who offered an arm.

And he took her to find what she really wanted—a plant she remembered from her mother’s garden. Scarlet sage, she thought it was called.  But it wasn’t the right plant.

My mom explained some more.

“Red salvia,” he said. “You want red salvia. I’ll order it for you.”

Back at home, my mom consulted her photo albums while I planted the flowers.

Most days, we work together outside, pulling weeds, giving some Miracle Grow here, and extra water there. My mom might be tired at the end of these sessions. But she’s no longer weary and worn.

“I wish,” she said this morning, “that I could tell my mom what we’ve been doing out here in the garden.”

And the premonition came to me that someday I’ll wish the same thing.