The quest for the pink slipper

There are times when I would love to return to a certain point in my childhood and relive it (with the ability to return to the present, of course).

I was thinking today about how I have the inherent ability to kill all plants even with research and much effort to give them everything they need.  The only plant that I've been unable to kill is a tall palm that my mother gave me.  I think this is due to the fact that it can regenerate itself no matter what the damage.  In fact, you can cut it off and the stump will regrow.  If you take the top that you cut off and stick it in soil, that will grow a new tree too.  Like I said, impossible to kill.

My grandmother has an amazing green thumb.  She can grow anything from seed, bulb, clipping, or seemingly nothing.  And she was able to do this in Newfoundland, which has a growing season of about 2 months..  the rest of the year consists of imminent snow, snow, and melting snow. 
I have envied her for as long as I can remember.  When I was awaiting the birth of my sister, my family stayed with my grandparents.  It was a long, cold winter in my mind and I remember watching Nan water and care for her many plants.  I wanted to grow one of my own from scratch, not realizing the time frame involved.  The two of us then planted an apple seed that I eagerly checked on everyday.  I was disappointed day after day until finally I noticed a tiny twig in the center of the pot.  This twig was about one centimeter tall.  I remember being so excited.  Looking back, I believe that the twig was put there on purpose.  What better way to appease an impatient 4 year old, eh?

When I was 11, my family lived in the same "town" as my grandparents.  I use the word "town" generously as there was only a handful of houses, about 30-40 residents, a post office, and a corner store that was always closed when the soap operas were on.  Because of the lack of entertainment and/or friends, I soon learned how to be independently entertained.  I climbed trees, went for long walks in the woods tracking foxes and rabbits, monitored the local frog pond's pollywog progression into mini-toads, dug up a LOT of fool's gold, hand fed Grey Jays, and much more.
One day my grandmother mentioned wanting a certain flower for her garden.  It was a Pink Lady's Slipper Orchid.  She told me a funny anecdote about the time she stuck her finger inside one once and there was a bee inside.  I was fascinated.  And I was determined to get it for her.

You're MINE!

Little did I know that they don't just grow all over the place all willy-nilly.  I searched HIGH & LOW for that ridiculous flower.  I didn't have the internet at my fingertips at the time, nor a public library, so I had no idea where they grow, what time of the year, or anything at all!  After a while I decided that these flowers did not exist in our area, so I switched to transplanting wild multicoloured foxgloves to her garden (yes, they are weeds.  I know this now.  I did not know this at 11)  One day I was traipsing about in the woods quite far from home when I saw a dense wall of foxgloves.  I climbed the hill and fought my way into the middle of the bunch in order to see a pretty white one that I had not gotten for my grandmother yet.  I was staring up at it and thinking of how to get it back so far when I looked down to see how hard it would be to transplant.  Low and behold, there it was in all it's glory.  A Pink Lady's Slipper.  I ran home as fast as I could to grab a pail and spade.  I then dug it up and planted it in the middle of Nan's garden.  I can only imagine that she was a little sad to see this pretty little orchid in it's poor condition after it ran into me.  I'm also pretty sure that it promptly died as a result of my haphazard hacking of it's root system.  Come to think of it, I think all the foxgloves died too..  and they're WEEDS.

Turn it off!!

I left the oven on the other day.  All night.  My husband then told me that I could've burned the apartment down, all the while putting on his best impression of my father.

My dad was very insistent on turning everything off while I was growing up.  He still is, but I don't hear him anymore since I no longer live with him.  He has a mantra that he practically chants on his way out the door:  "Make sure you turn off and unplug everything.  And turn down the heat.  Make sure the doors are locked.  Did you turn off the curling iron??"
We have to unplug everything because appliances will blow up.  Heat is expensive.  We will be home invaded, tied to chairs, tortured, and shot if the doors aren't locked.  As for the curling iron...  that is something we haven't done in maybe 10-15 years, so I don't know why it's on the list.

He does have a point in some cases.  There was a rash of violent home invasions in our general area several years ago.  Also, gas prices are soaring, so why not save on the heating bill?  He and my mother do insist that they've known people who's TV exploded.  I'm not sure if they remember their names or not, but it happened!

His fear of fire has probably been honed by my sister and the few days of torture that she put him through when we first moved into our new house 12 years ago.  My sister was not yet fully trusted with stove top elements or the big oven, so my dad compromised and bought a toaster oven.  Not much damage you can do with those things, right?  The day after he bought it, I was sitting on the couch when my dad started yelling in the kitchen.  Suddenly he ran by holding the toaster oven over his head, flames blazing out of it.  He somehow managed to get the back door open and flung it out onto the snow-covered deck.  We then watched it in silence as it finished burning the remnants of the taco shells my sister had been "browning".  He then ranted and raved a bit, before returning it to the store and telling them it was defective.
Fast-forward to the next day.  My sister must've had another craving for toasty taco shells because she was at it again.  And once again it was flung out into the snow in a dramatic fashion.  One more "defective" toaster oven was returned to the store, and my sister was at once banned from using it without his supervision.

oops

Poor dad.  The stresses involved with having kids.

For the record, I may have left the oven on overnight, but last week my husband left a giant candle burning overnight.  There was little left of it in the morning and somehow it didn't burn through the tabletop.  Which one's worse??