A Year of Gratitude – October 21, 2024
I found my gratitude in the garden today. This time of year, I’m grateful to have anything still growing in the garden. The nights are getting colder and we’ve had frost warnings a few times over the last week. Any plants hardy enough to still be standing are worthy of applause.
I’ve been sharing this group of zinnias with you all summer long. My mom and I planted them in the spring. We sunk transplants in the ground and hoped that the spindly green stems would be able to set roots and grow beautiful flowers for our family to enjoy.
They did. Six transplants turned into a stand of zinnias that flourished all summer. They grew in red and pinks with a few bright purple blooms mixed in.
These flowers didn’t just delight us. The pollinators visited every day, flitting about from stem to stem. I loved watching the stems dance from the motion of bees, butterflies, and dragonflies taking off from one big bloom and bouncing on to another. Each landing and takeoff gave those stems movement, made them bounce and sway with life.
We’ve planted zinnias in our garden for years now. They’re not new to us. Yet this year’s group seemed particularly cheery and full of life.
This morning, when I went out to do my morning round of chores, I noticed that the petals had been transformed by frost and dew and sunlight. I can only suppose that frost from a particularly cold night was warmed by the morning sun to create droplets of water on the edges of the petals.
The result was a bright and beautifully colored zinnia with petals that have dried to resemble a piece of parchment paper. I could look at this bloom and see damage in that change. I could concentrate on the reality that the supple petals have dried and changed. Or I could look at the contrast and celebrate that this zinnia is still beautiful, simply in a new and different way.
I’ll choose the second. I’ll celebrate that what was a tiny, fragile stem this spring set root in this patch of ground we call home. It brightened our days and provided for the pollinators that helped to make our garden harvest so bountiful.
Even now, in its final days, it has something beautiful to offer me: a reminder that the changes we go through in life can be beautiful. There are certain physical changes in life that show our age, our wisdom, and the journey we have traveled to arrive at this place.
The grey hair and wrinkles I carry now are no different from this zinnia’s petals. They are signs of the roads I have traveled to be in the place I am now, the spot I stand in today. They’re not something to be ashamed of. They’re not merely a sign of what has been lost. Instead, they are a sign of what has been gained: time.
These marks are only visible when we have the gift of the time needed to acquire them. I look at this flower and see something beautiful. I hope that you do too.
This post is part of our A Year of Gratitude Series. You can find the introduction, inspiration, and entire year’s gratitude’s posts here.