She’s a real Thanksgiving cactus this year, opening her hot pink blooms for the holiday of gratitude, just as the world turns gray and brown. She’s put on a show before – quite a few in fact, when you consider that I’ve had her since about 2002. A gift from a co-worker, she was a tiny little thing that I shoved in the guest/storage room and basically forgot about over the years. That may have done her more good than harm, as overwatering these plants is their number one cause of death and distress.
Over the years, I potted her up, trimmed her down, and did my best to coddle her once I saw her resilience and perennial beauty at this time of the year. It’s as if she sensed the most dismal and dark time of the year and decided to gift us a balm of beauty and bright color. There have been some rough patches along there way – recently, after upgrading her into a larger clay pot, she showed a flush of new growth, then suddenly lost one of her main stalks, reducing her structure by a good third, without reason or explanation. Since then, she’s slowly rebuilt herself, and this year’s crop of blooms is a fine one. A pleasant reminder that life is not about perfection, but the growth it takes to attempt it.
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