Scared Straight

Scared Straight

I’ve been pushing pretty hard to get a project out the door that got delayed because of communication issues. My part is now done and I’m just waiting for Engineers to complete their work so we can go on to permitting. Lot’s came up during this past week of crunch and one thing stands out for sure. Work cuts into my blogging.

Last weekend I did a bit of research as to why two of our healthy dark green leafed Orchids are not blooming as I had expected them to this time of year. As it turns out they were just too “comfortable” to do so. It’s true, to get Orchids to bloom they must feel stressed out and nervous about their chances for further existence. To get award winning blooms one must mindfully neglect and intimidate each plant until they go over the edge and send out a shoot.  “Humm????” I thought as I Googled further, “This has all the makings of one fine Science Experiment”.

I used to work for a bunch of “off the boat” Italians and one of the Patriarchs used to talk about “Ants in the Sugar Bowl” . He would go on and on in his accented English about how hard an ant would work and work and work , day in day out, week after week , until he found a “sugar bowl”. Once he found the sugar bowl he would emit his “signal” and the rest of the ants would come to reap all the rewards of the #1 ant until they all laid back in the bowl exhausted from gorging as the younger ones hauled the “loot” back to home base.  As we would walk through his factory he would point at this employee or that one and say “ant” ……..”ant”…….”ant”. I am so grateful I no longer have employees !!

So for the last few days I’ve been putting my Orchid Experiment to the test with all sorts of lab studies in a variety of conditions. Human interactions I’m finding are also not helped with too much fertilizer and care unless they are under the ages of 18. In fact some of the best blooming individuals I know have produced beautiful blossoms once they “got out of the greenhouse”. Personally, I can think back to my “private yoga session” whereby my instructor essentially told me that all of my old war wounds and injuries we in my head and that I WOULD heal them if I would just push past the pain ONCE. Wow was she right.  I’m sure more will come to me as the experiments continue.

I need to cut this one a bit short as it’s time for me to go an glare at a couple of high brow plants and assure them that the porch is only one doorway away. More soon.