Like Pet Cemetary...except Plant Cemetary.

Last fall, I was happily strolling through the garden center at Wal Mart and choosing clearance items for next year's (which is now this year's) gardening fun.  Kyler came up to me and showed me his great deal.  It was a potted dead stick.  He held it up proudly and said, "I want THIS.  It's only two dollars!"  I asked what it was supposed to be and he said, "A blackberry bush," though I had much trouble believing that.  I told him that yes, he could have a blackberry bush, but only if he chose one that was alive.  His face dropped and he said, "This is the last one."  Not being my argumentative child, he quickly changed into his I've-got-a-great-idea face and said, "I'll buy it with my own money."


It was slightly painful watching Kyler shell out his own hard-earned dollars for a dead stick, but I am not one to intervene with life's lessons and my theory is that the younger you learn them, the better. 


By the time we got home, I'd already forgotten  about the sad purchase.  Kyler, however, went immediately into the shed and pulled out a shovel.  He began digging in the middle of the yard.  I couldn't just watch and do nothing so I helped him plant the stick.  As nicely as I could, I tried to brace him for the future, telling him that this bush would probably not ever bloom and by no fault of his own.  Always the optimist, he told me that he would share his blackberries with me.

 Well, it's next year and this is what the dead stick looked like approximately two hours ago:

Apparently, it flourished.  And in the thick of the summer, while our land is cracking apart and everything seems to be wilting away (except the weeds, of course), this blackberry bush continues to grow up and out, reaching for the sky and stretching out as if it wants to hug me.  Well, probably not me, but maybe Kyler.  And thank goodness he's not the I-told-you-so type; there is obviously no need for that.  I write this while hanging my head in shame.  Look what might not have been because of me!  To show my sympathy for ever doubting Kyler's magical green thumb, I planted an entire garden around the miracle bush. 

And you can't see, but about ten feet away from the blackberry bush, Kyler planted another stick that has now taken root and grown beautiful red leaves, showing us that it is truly not a stick after all, but rather a mighty red oak tree named Andrew.

What will he plant next?  Well, he's been saving his watermelon seeds so watch out.  Good thing we're a very watermelon-friendly family because he has a whole bag full of seeds saved by now.  After witnessing him turning sticks into trees, I'm expecting more than just a few watermelons.  Perhaps a watermelon house will grow.  Or a watermelon sky will appear and we will have watermelon rain and in the winter, enjoy watermelon snow.  I may be getting ahead of myself, but I'm just giving you the head's up.  Don't say you weren't properly forewarned.