Small victories
Jun. 15th, 2020 10:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
offcntrI have this story from my sister, as I'd already gone away to college at the time. One morning she was eating breakfast with my Grandmother, who lived with us all through my childhood. (Technically, I guess, we lived with her. My dad was the only son among eight sisters, in a Wisconsin farm family. When he married mom, they moved into the one upstairs bedroom not attached to the others, and kept farming. Grandpa died, his sisters left home and us kids gradually filled up their rooms.)
Grandma had been diagnosed with late onset diabetes, which she controlled with diet. She stopped using sugar in her coffee, left one end of the (sheet pan-sized) pies unsweetened, ate grapefruit for breakfast. It seemed to work well enough; she lived till nearly 90. Anyway, she was having her breakfast grapefruit, popped out a seed. With a little smile for Maggie, she reached to the center of the table, where a potted houseplant of some sort had given up the ghost, pressed the seed in the soil and covered it up.
To everyone's surprise, it sprouted. Grew into a nice little evergreen citrus bush, about three feet tall. Maggie kept it in her upstairs bedroom until she went away to college and a particularly cold Wisconsin winter combined with an under-heated farmhouse did it in.
Fast forward 40 years. Denise had found some peat-ball seed starters while going through the clutter, decided to see if she could start some old herb seeds, also found in that sweep. The balls weren't growing much except moss, when she found a couple of seeds in her--supposedly seedless--navel orange. And planted them.
Guess what came up? She's been keeping it safe from the dry furnace air through February and March in an empty mayo jar, but it's starting to outgrow the bubble. We'll repot it this week, see how it does.
My Grandma would be proud.
Grandma had been diagnosed with late onset diabetes, which she controlled with diet. She stopped using sugar in her coffee, left one end of the (sheet pan-sized) pies unsweetened, ate grapefruit for breakfast. It seemed to work well enough; she lived till nearly 90. Anyway, she was having her breakfast grapefruit, popped out a seed. With a little smile for Maggie, she reached to the center of the table, where a potted houseplant of some sort had given up the ghost, pressed the seed in the soil and covered it up.
To everyone's surprise, it sprouted. Grew into a nice little evergreen citrus bush, about three feet tall. Maggie kept it in her upstairs bedroom until she went away to college and a particularly cold Wisconsin winter combined with an under-heated farmhouse did it in.
Fast forward 40 years. Denise had found some peat-ball seed starters while going through the clutter, decided to see if she could start some old herb seeds, also found in that sweep. The balls weren't growing much except moss, when she found a couple of seeds in her--supposedly seedless--navel orange. And planted them.
Guess what came up? She's been keeping it safe from the dry furnace air through February and March in an empty mayo jar, but it's starting to outgrow the bubble. We'll repot it this week, see how it does.
My Grandma would be proud.