Sunshine blooming

I planted seeds with abandon as it was already late to be planting seeds if not late to be planting potted plants. But I bought some mixed perennial seed packs and spread them through my new flower garden. I waited and waited. Small green would pop its head out from the mulch and that was the first joy, true joy I had  had from a gardening experience. Yes, I realize that watching seeds grow into plants is something that is amazing when first done in 3rd grade. But who says the amazement has to end in adulthood.

So you can imagine my excitement over the sunflower that is as tall as me bloom over the weekend. One, my love, love of sunflowers. I buy one every weekend at the Farmer's market. I have watched it grow from a small seedling on an exponential growth curve. Like my other seeds that sprouted, the growth rate was exceedingly slow at first and I was sure that by the time they grew to full size it would likely be the middle of NC summer in which plants have little chance of survival. However, the plants I now realize were on an exponential growth curve (is this common?). Slow slow slow in the take off and now a sizable increase in height with each new day. Like rings on a tree but on the exterior, there is a circle around where the plant was in the ground the previous day and now was 1-2-3 inches taller. Many are blooming. Most I have no idea what they are, what flowers they will have or what color they will be. Which makes walking out my door each morning one of the beautifully simple joys in life.

"Sunshine" my lovely sunflower.

My sunflower however is just beyond what I ever could have expected. That I could grow one at all. That it would be as tall as me.  That I didn't have to purchase what someone else had grown but what I had meticulously planted and tended. That it is a living sunflower and did not have to be cut for my enjoyment.

Sunshine about to bloom! 

I have always felt that sunflowers capture the essence of the light that the sun brings. They brighten my life.

I like to name plants, animals and inanimate objects. I will call the sunflower "sunshine". As it truly is the manifestation of the energy from the sun cultivated by the intricate organism of a sunflower, growing from and upon blooming fully expressing the light of the sun. Illuminating my world (and perhaps other coop residents who pass it entering our gate).