For as long as I can remember, there have been peonies in my life.
Not just the type of flower, mind you, but the exact same flowers. They traveled hundreds of miles and survived multiple moves.
Until writing this article, I didn’t even know why. I just knew that thanks to my family, the peonies had followed me in every place that I’d lived, like a shadow that I couldn’t quite shake.
My love/hate relationship with peonies
The first place I remember the peonies was at my mom’s childhood home (the home of my grandmother, aunt and cousin). I helped my mother dig some of them up and plant them at our house. When we later moved to a new home with the rest of my family, the peonies went right along with us.
Every Memorial Day, we’d visit my grandmother’s parents’ graves—which have peonies planted upon them. While we were there, we dropped off flowers of our own (also peonies).
It’s not that I ever hated the peonies… they just weren’t my favorite. See, peonies tend to be covered with a whole lot of ants, and as someone who’s always preferred the “Great Indoors,” that was pretty unappealing.
More than that, though, I took them for granted. Just like my mother and grandmother, the peonies had always been there.
A mother’s dying wish
In 2018, my mom was diagnosed with stage 4 terminal cancer. Within a month, my mom had gone through surgery and started chemo. After two months, we’d moved her, my grandmother and my aunt into new homes and sold the house where I’d grown up. Frankly, the last thing on my mind at that point was flowers.
Yet, my mother insisted we bring the peonies.
They weren’t the only flowers we saved from the old house, but they were certainly the ones I was most exasperated by. Gardening wasn’t my favorite task anyway, and between the stress and the fact it was February at the time, getting the peonies hadn’t exactly been a priority for me.
However, when your terminally ill mother asks you to help her dig up flowers, you dig up flowers.
Though we did transport the peonies to the new house, they never made it into the ground. In the chaos of everything, we left them in a bucket with no water or dirt for months. We kept meaning to plant them, but never had the time or energy.
Not too surprisingly, the peonies died.
Though my mom never said so, I always suspected that she was a little sad that the peonies hadn’t made it. I tried to be understanding, but honestly, I was just relieved to have one less thing on the to-do list. I figured we could always get new peonies eventually.
Then, my mom died, too, and it didn’t really matter anymore.
The peonies’ return
When I moved to a new home, I brought as many flowers with me as I could because they reminded me of her.
This time, it was my roommate who was patiently resisting the urge to roll her eyes as I insisted I needed to dig up “just one more” before we left. (The “dead mom” card is nearly as good as the “I’m dying” card when it comes to getting help moving flowers.)
What we couldn’t move, of course, were the peonies.
I hadn’t realized how much this was bothering me until my mom’s friends reached out to ask if I wanted any flowers. Peonies tend to multiply easily, and my mom had spent years sharing extra with our friends, family and community. Suddenly, I found that generosity circling back around.
That fall, my mom’s friend brought several peonies—the same peonies I remembered—and we planted them at once.
Green thumbs aren’t genetic
Though I’d spent my life helping my grandmothers and my mom garden, I’d never planned a garden or tried to single-handedly keep one alive. Let me tell you—it’s not nearly as easy as they made it look.
See, Kansas has an abundance of clay soil, which isn’t ideal for most flowers. Suddenly, I was learning about “amending the soil,” testing for acidity and a whole lot of other things I’d never really paid any attention to.
However, even as half my plants withered and died, and I repeatedly forgot to water them, the peonies persisted.
They didn’t just survive—they thrived.
Why the peonies thrived
I started looking into why the peonies were doing so well when everything else was such a struggle.
I learned that peonies can live more than 100 years—which made sense, considering the peonies in my own yard were older than I was. I learned, too, that peonies “thrive on neglect” and tolerate a huge range of soil types and pH levels, which was why they were so forgiving of (almost) every way they were mistreated. Though all peonies are considered pretty hardy, the ones in my garden have survived six different moves that I know of (which was a stark contrast to the hibiscus flower that I planted the same year, which managed to wilt and die in the time it took me to carry it across the yard).
I learned why we had so many peonies. Apparently, my aunt had rescued them from a neighbor’s yard when it was taken over by new owners. The previous neighbor had been known for breeding award-winning peonies, and my aunt asked if she could dig them up and keep them rather than letting them get thrown away. My family didn’t have much money back then, and flowers were sort of at the bottom of the list of things we could afford. But free? Well, that was a price that even we could swing.
As my gardening improved, I also learned why my family always took peonies to the graves on Memorial Day. It turned out, most of the other perennials in my mom’s garden bloomed too early or too late. But the peonies? Always right on time.
Learning from those who came before us
Four years after my mother died, my grandmother died.
Every day since, I’ve fumbled my way through life, wishing I could ask them why they did things the way they did. More often than not, I eventually figure out the answer through my own trial and error.
Often, when I’m watching the peonies bloom, I think back on how far they’ve come. I consider the generations they’ve seen through, the hardships they’ve endured and the way they keep blooming anyway.
I think of my family.
I didn’t understand back then why we needed to keep the ant-infested flowers close. Now, I do.
Now, I know that they’re easy to care for and free to share. I know that they live for ages and bloom at just the right time.
And I know that, as usual, my mom knew best all along.
Photo by Tom Merton/iStock.com
