“The Day I Understood the Meaning of Renewal”

It seems like yesterday when I received a mild scolding from my aunt, an expert horticulturist in my eyes, who caught me in the act of discarding a plant. Despite watering it for weeks, my green thumb efforts rendered a combo of lifeless greenery and leaf loss. If you have struggled to produce radiant plants, this story comes with a warning that floral mishap flashbacks might be reawakened.

With folded arms, my aunt stood back, sizing me up with her disbelieving deep brown eyes to suggest abandonment was not an option. The woman of strong religious faith dug deeper, questioning whether I thought it was appropriate to discard a clothing item simply because it was missing a button.

In her authoritative voice, she emphasized that we do not stop saying our prayers when the answers we want do not come. To ensure I absorbed the message, she reminded me that in adversity, faith is something that we cannot abandon.

The petite Corpus Christi native removed the plant from my trembling hands and suggested we attempt to bring it back to life. I watched intently as she cleared the ailing plant of its shriveled leaves to transfer to a bowl of water for a 30-minute soak.

Carefully, she affixed the saturated leaves snugly to the exposed roots. If something so simple was all there was to renewing the plant’s failing health, I now felt awful about wanting to trash it.

To pick my spirits up, she made repeating the process my assignment. After three days, we removed the plant from the vessel it had outgrown, replanting it in a larger planter with fresh potting soil. I watered it sparsely as she directed and within 30 days, the discovery of budding leaves wowed me. Remarkably, a living thing I errantly deemed dead was alive.

As illustrated, renewal transcends the human spirit, and restoration frequently surfaces as a far more advantageous solution than abandonment.

Shari Wright, UU Education Coordinator