A succulent story

When my son was small enough to jump on the sofa, he fell off once and landed on a cactus and then lay patiently in my lap as I pulled the spines out, one by one. That would never happen today: he's too tall to stand on the sofa, much less jump on it; I don't have a lap that big; and that particular cactus is no longer with us.

We still have enough cacti to make dusting hazardous, but we lost a bunch of large succulents just after we adopted our late cat. Apparently she mistook the cactus pots for litter boxes and overwatered them. The most painful loss was the death of a beloved pencil plant, a gift from my brother, which my husband loved like a third child and still fondly remembers after all these years.

So yesterday when we walked into a Dr. Seuss landscape and found first a pencil plant that reached my shoulders and then another that stretched far overhead and then more densely packed rows of pencil plants, we were in cactus heaven. Rufous hummingbirds buzzed about the blooms as we walked a dusty switchback trail, each curve revealing a new landscape of bizarre succulents. Barrel cacti lurked at knee level while towering succulents loomed overhead, more varieties than we could identify. 

If we lived familiarly amongst such wonders we might pass them by without a glance, but I hope not. I wouldn't ever want to be inured to such spectacular grotesques. I would, in fact, transport the entire cactus garden into my living room just to be reminded that nature never tires of producing beauty bizarre enough to pierce ours spirits and let in light.

Or, if we're not careful, poke us right in the keister.