Mama Knows.

My dad always loved gardening and puttering with plants. But was never a real horticulturist - he just sort of did stuff and waited to see if it worked. And when it came to pruning, he just attacked whatever it was with a chainsaw or weed whacker  then fed it all sorts of chemicals to bring it back to life. 

Sometime around the turn of the millennium, he lovingly saved a seed from an orange and threw it in some dirt and kept it at work over the winter. It sprouted and grew, and in the spring he brought it home and presented it to mom. 

She sort of scoffed and reminded him his little sprig of green wasn't really meant to flourish Northern countries like Canada. However, she did humour him by faithfully watering it for him. 

And lo and behold, if the darn thing didn't actually grow into a 6-foot tree. It dropped about a billion leaves a year and mom would get tired of cleaning them up and throw the tree out on the deck each summer, only to feel sorry for it and haul it back in for the winter months.  

Dad would half-jokingly check for buds and fruit periodically. Mom would laugh. 

Then she found a story on the internet, or in a Reader's Digest or something, about a man who had a lemon tree and though he faithfully tended it, it never produced until the year after he died. So Mom began to tease Dad about the bumper crops she was going to get from his little orange tree after he died. (For surely, we were all certain, Mom was going to outlive him by years.) 

When they moved from Kelowna they contemplated getting rid of the messy little tree. But Dad wasn't ready to give up on it yet. So the saga of the sad little orange tree dropping leaves all over the place in the winter, and perking up again on the deck in the summer, continued on in Kamloops. 

And then Mom went to heaven and left Dad on his own to tend the orange tree. And then it really became a sad little tree with Dad's inconsistent watering and harsh pruning - even though we all hoped beyond hope that Mama would pull some strings in heaven and let it flower for Dad. 

It never did. 

And when Dad passed two-and-a-half years later, in the middle of June, the sad little tree hadn't even made it out to the deck yet that year. And its leaves were sparse. It was my full intention to leave the thing in the house (or rather, out on the deck) when we sold it. But Ted decided he'd take the damn thing home and put it on his own deck and neglectfully water it when the notion struck his fancy. 

So today, as I'm casually wandering through Winners, I get this photo texted from my sister-in-law Diana to our siblings group, with the text "Holy Crap! Ed's tree grew an orange!" : 

Call me a skeptic, but my response to seeing an orange in her hand, not on the tree, was "It's a little early for April Fools, but nice try."  

They offered further proof, that although the orange was found on the floor beside the tree, it appeared to have come from the plant.  

So, imagine me, in Winner's not watching where I'm walking and texting and sort of giggling and really trying not to cry. And yet, with my Dad's blood in veins, I'm still sort of skeptical. "Check with your kids. They probably set you up."  But really, that tree has never had a growth thing like this: 

While peeling and preparing to eat the orange they wondered if it would be sweet or bitter.  

I told them it would be bitter because they never even noticed when he was blooming and producing fruit. 

And yup, they say it tasted like orange, but was bitter.

And there was one seed to plant and start the process all over again.  

Feeling marginally guilty for neglecting the poor tree and not even noticing it producing, my sis-in-law sets to cleaning it up, watering and pruning and showing some love to Ed's tree. And she lets out a scream, and sent another photo.    "There's another one!" 

Getting a bit giddy about the whole thing, yet still wanting to cover my butt from being gullible, I asked for them to stand beside the tree and send a photo. Ted sends us 'Dad's hand' with the new little orange. 🤘🏻It's true. Dad's sad little orange tree began producing after he got to heaven to start sending out instructions. 

Mama knew it all along!  I don't know how long an orange takes to ripen, but I'm hoping it it's ready to eat and sweet for March 14th, when Mama gets her 5-year pin in heaven.