貓鎮的小公寓
Where Hui & Little Cat Dwell

是忘了在夏天綻放

還是知道在屬於楓紅的季節裡
會得到更多眷戀的眼光

又開花了…

Grandiflora Rose ‘Lagerfeld’

I guess it’s a bit unromantic to describe a beautiful, lavender rose to be “as big as a bowl”, but somehow this expression keeps coming up to my mind lately. :)

This is the second year we have this rose bush, and we’ve been having fresh roses in our place for the past month (or two).

See, it does help if you talk to your flowers. They will love you back.

I guess spring IS here…

Gardenia Augusta ‘Veitchii’ (everblooming gardenia)

奶奶家的院子裡有一棵梔子花, 在一進大門最右邊的角落裡.

小時候完全沒辦法把 “梔子花” 跟那棵樹連在一起. 我只知道它會開很香的花, 奶奶很喜歡. 有時候會剪下幾朵放在客廳裡. 有些人從圍牆外面走過去的時候會順手摘一朵, 奶奶發現了就會很生氣. 奶奶的口音講起來總是像吱吱花, 我也就跟著講. 至少講到大學吧… ^^”

Anyways, 眷村的房子被拆了以後, 梔子花就只是記憶裡的那棵樹了. 偶爾聞到梔子花香味的東西, 心裡的感覺總是 “啊, 還是真花比較好聞”.

Don’t remember when I actually relate the word “gardenia” to the childhood memory. Probably in the nursery we visited when we wanted to get some plants for the first apartment we lived in together in the States. I *think* I smelled it first before knowing it’s there…

Oh, and I knew the vocabulary “gardenia” from the song “Blue Gardenia”, which is in the sound track of Bridges over Madison County. Of course they always have the sign hanging above the plants they’re selling, that was probably when everything comes together. The smell, my 吱吱花, and gardenia.

The gardenia plant we have now is called Everblooming Gardenia. It smells and looks like the one we used to have in grandma’s place the most. According to Western Garden Book, this is actually the oldest variety of gardenia! Guess my nose and eyes are working quite well with my memory. :)

I replanted the gardenia first to a terra cotta pot, and later to a glazed pot with white dripping glaze effect kinda. Looks nice. The white goes with the flower. :) I can smell it now when I walk out to my deck.

… and I guess this is how I remember my grandma.

And so mom and I got the THIRD gardenia plant after we moved to my condo. I told myself, if this one dies, too, that’ll be the end of my planting gardenia. It’s so easy in Taiwan!!! (Well not a surprise since it’s native from Taiwan.) My dad was bragging about they bought a plant for about $1.50 and it bloomed right away.

Everything seemed to be going well with the 3rd plant. Lots of buds grew after we had it for a couple of weeks. But then came the exterior painting period of our condo, and we’re supposed to remove everything from the deck. Mom brought gardenia into the house, and after 2 weeks, you know what, all the buds fell. ALL OF THEM! The leaves were still ok, but no buds. NOT A SINGLE ONE LEFT!

Then came winter, mom thought it’s too cold to leave it outside, so it kept staying in the house. Now even the leaves were not so nice anymore since it’s always dark inside with the blinds closed and everything… I later insisted leaving the plant on the deck on a kinda sunny spot during winter. Aunt Ma gave some advice, too, saying that I left it in a good location, so mom eventually bought what I was doing. The leaves started to become oily green again. Still no buds.

Febuary was REALLY hot this year (2004), and gardenia’s leaves turned yellow ’cause of too much sunlight! I didn’t think about moving the plant to a shadier spot before it’s too late. (Seriously, who’d think it’s gonna be too hot in Febuary!) We relocated it, pruned it, fed it, and hoped for the best. The warm weather helped the development of the buds, I guess, and now, we have a full blossom in, err, JUNE?! Anyways… The plants seem to be healthy and all, and that’s the most important… :D

The gardenia plant in the picture is actually the 3rd one we have.

The first one, which was kept on the patio of the first apartment we rented, died from maybe some disease, or pest invasion. Now come to think of it, it might even be the lack of sunlight. ’cause from our later experience, though every book said it’s shade-tolerant, gadenia still needs a few hours of good sun in order to bloom. It just died… the leaves were totally dried out and would crack if you touch it. Watering and feeding didn’t help at all. Hum. Sounds like some sci-fi movie. Anyways, that’s the end of that.

Dad bought me the 2nd gardenia plant during his staying here in summer 2002. For some reason, (ok, maybe the lack of sunlight again,) it just simply didn’t bloom! Well we had the buds growing all right, and then they’d just fall off when they’re big enough to bloom. (Ok, I’m SURE it’s the lack of sunlight now.) I sort of deliberately ignored the plant. So, after watering my plants with some silly timer-controlled water flow for two weeks, it died ’cause, well, lack of water. I tried to stupidly save it by cutting off all the dried leaves and wigs, and, err, obviously no photosynthesis process can go on after I did that and the plant, err, died.

[To be continued...]