My mother grew African Violets when I was a child. I remember how she fret over them. My father installed a shelf in an east window. There she set her violets to grow. She tended them and took such pride in them it now suggests to me the violets were very important to her.

We had no other plants in the house during the long Minnesota winters. But every day she looked in on her violets. I believe she was successful but it was a woman’s hobby so I took little interest.

While wandering through the produce section in my local grocery in late winter, I saw African Violets on sale so I bought one to brighten my apartment at the end of our horrible winter last March. Also, it reminded me of my mother!

The little plant struggled along in the window I placed it where I thought the light would be gentle. Slowly it began to die.

When it finally lost all it’s blossoms, I moved it to a west window where it gets intense light for a few hours each day. That window sill is the Plant Hospice, where my struggling plants go to die. I had no hope for it, but you don’t toss a plant with life. I began watering it from the bottom, and it shared in the fertilizer laced water my outside patio plants received.

Now I have this beauty loaded with blossoms. It encouraged me to purchase another, more pink in color. I want to learn if the first violet was dumb luck, or a further flowering of my feminine side.