A snapdragon blooms in Columbus.
Not quite as lofty as a tree growing in Brooklyn, but you
get the idea.
As I wrote this in late December, a lush and feisty snapdragon
continued to flower a few yards from the Dispatch building,
defying nature.
No one told this snapdragon that it should have died long
before, that temperatures dipping into the 20s ought to
have withered its stems, turned its leaves black.
But it grew, as it did all year, oblivious to its less-than-optimal
conditions.
This plucky plant was not a coddled greenhouse flower carefully
tended through the growing season. It was a volunteer --
a plant that started on its own from seeds dropped by a
predecessor.
From the outset, the snapdragon had battled the odds. Unless
wind or an animal carried the fine seed to the flower bed,
the minuscule grain that provided life was at least several
years old, the flower bed having been bare the past two
summers.
Walking past the bed daily, I noticed the plant grow and
flourish as spring turned to summer. More than once, I wondered
how it could live when it didn't seem to receive any rain;
the overhang of a building keeps the bed desert-dry.
And yet the snapdragon survived -- nay, thrived.
Through June and July, the low-growing plant was covered
with pale yellow blossoms kissed with a peach blush.
But as July turned to August, the plant "stalled"
in summer's inferno, and blooms tapered off.
Fearing that the snapdragon would not overcome both heat
and drought, I gave it a glass of water. Far from showing
its appreciation with perky leaves and a burst of color,
the plant took on a spindly and fragile look after my ministrations.
It drooped and lost its remaining flower buds.
I thought of the rules that explorers follow on Star Trek
and decided I should take no further action that would interfere
with the natural course of events. Whatever would happen
to this plant would happen. I would simply observe.
The snapdragon bounced back as summer's heat eased, and
it began blooming profusely again. It did not stop until
New Year's Day, when snow claimed the plant.
Blooms are frozen in time.
But the plant -- which should have lived only the summer
-- had already far exceeded expectations, thanks to a pocket
kept warm by stone, concrete and marble.
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