Better late than never

Last April I planted morning glory seeds at the street, carefully preparing the soil. My vision was of the mailbox covered with blue flowers that would delight early morning walkers and cause people to stop and admire each sky blue blossom.

Ha. Instead, I had massive vines with giant leaves and twirling stems so vigorous they reached out like tentacles, probably scaring every child that walked up the street. And, not a single bloom. Not one!!

By midsummer with the Godzilla vine in full force, I began wondering what in the world was going on and began researching. The information was vague. The best that I could determine was that morning glory needs poor soils and dry conditions, so all that compost and organic fertilizer that I poured into the ground before seeding and the more-than-ample rains we received all summer resulted in great growth – and no bloom.

By early August, I was tired of looking for blossoms so I ripped out most of the vine, leaving just enough to soften the metal pole of the mailbox. Two weeks later, you could barely tell I had removed anything. By this point, I had given up and just tried to keep the vines clipped back so my gardener- mail carrier could find the mailbox.

But guess what, a week ago – at the end of NOVEMBER, I walked out to find three beautiful sky blue flowers beginning to open. It was around noon but because of the short day hours and maybe because of the cool temperatures, it was a little late getting up in the morning, to say nothing of being really late getting up in the season. Why now? My guess is that the fertilizer had finally begun to leach out of the soil and that it finally dried out a bit.

Every few days, I would get a few blossoms, which I cherished. Until two nights ago when Atlanta got its first hard freeze and then – poof! Overnight the vine froze, the leaves turned dark and my morning glory dropped to the frozen ground.

So, in eight months I got a handful of blossoms. As much as I love flowers, I’m not sure that it was worth it. Although I have to admit that when it finally did bloom, I thought “morning glory” what an entirely appropriate name!