Last week I received a mysterious box in the mail. On the label, it said, "Gift Inside."

While visions of all sorts of things were in my head, most of them not really all that likely, I immediately went about the task of cutting the tape and pulling the staples.

I am still waiting for a gift package from my old buddy Ed McMahon, but he seems to have lost my address. I'd say he's over in Virginia playing the lottery like everyone else when the jackpot hits triple-digit millions. I may go play myself if I can find someone who'll loan me a dollar.

Soon I found myself opening the box, which had a peculiar smell seeping out from deep inside. Not a peculiar smell in a bad way; it was a nice smell, like moist earth and sunshine.

When I finally got the top flaps open and reached down to remove the stack of papers on top, I noticed a plastic bag underneath with roots like spaghetti extending in several directions.

At that point, I started to read some of the papers, when I realized that the package was from a reader who owns property in this county. She sent me an evergreen vybernum, a plant with which I am not acquainted. According to the sheet that came along with it, it has white, fragrant flowers and evergreen foliage. Of course, when it arrived, it was just a mass of roots wrapped in straw with two whips of woody stem sticking out. I can't wait to see what it becomes. As for the gift, it was one of those random acts of kindness that people sometimes do for other people. Usually that is something I have only read about, but this was one time I got to see it first hand. Don't get me wrong, many people have done nice things for me here.

You know, usually someone comes along to call or write just when you start wondering why you are still here and writing every week.

Earlier, she had read one of my columns about smelling the bubby rose bush beside my house, which is in bloom again. It's sweet odor seems to permeate my senses every time I get near it.

I think I will dry out some of its petals and put them away to smell later, like homemade potpourri. I bet they won't smell nearly so good after they dry out.

Even though I didn't know about the vybernum, I can usually tell one flower from another. I can also usually tell the weeds from the garden plants, but it didn't start out that way. I helped ‘weed' the garden one time and pulled up part of the produce by mistake. Gee, I remember thinking, these weeds look like radishes on the bottom.

Metaphors

Plants are metaphors of our lives — they start off as a seed, turn into a tender young sprout, grow to a robust plant, have to live out their lives in fertilizer and then produce offspring, get frostbit and wither away and die. Reading back over that, it sounds pretty morose in a way, just like life is sometimes. I suppose I could have made my metaphor a little happier, but honesty is the best policy.

At any rate, I do think it makes life easier to cope with if we have plants and cute little critters around us. In other words, it really helps you stop and smell the roses, if clichés are more to your liking. Sniffing flowers is a safe and enjoyable pastime, unless you grow opium poppies of believe in a real life version of the "Little Shop of Horrors," in which case, I don't want to sniff your flowers anyway. As for the cute little critters, you need them for their daily donations as well as a pastime.

In fact, I couldn't fertilize the flowers without them. I planted a new ever blooming miniature rose earlier this year. It has already bloomed out in bright yellow and some of the petals have fallen to the ground like confetti after a party. I kind of expected it to have bigger flowers, but I am really just glad that it lived and bloomed. In fact, I use rabbit droppings almost exclusivel, including beneath my new plantings. I put them on strawberry plants, onions and garlic, peas, potatoes, carrots, radishes, parsnips, turnips and greens. So far, my plants agree with them very well and they don't start any new weed growth, unlike cow pies. Only the parsnips aren't growing well. I had my first radish Saturday and it was sweet and juicy, unlike the barely edible balls of fire I grew last year.

So just remember, behind every lovely flower there's a big pile of something, and it usually isn't rose petals.

Get more tongue in cheek commentary this week's issue of the Alleghany News!

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