My step-mom (or Nana as I call her) loves to grow flowers. She always has a variety of plant life growing all around her house. She plants things in the ground, in baskets, and sometimes in some very creative places. She has something growing year round at her house.
This year Nana was diagnosed with cancer. When spring came around she was too tired to plant her flowers. Her immune system was depleted so she really couldn’t leave the house to buy new plants. Nana was content with not having flowers this year, but I was not. Even if she couldn’t come outside, I wanted her to have something pretty to look at through the window.
I started by buying a few flowers to fill her hanging baskets. The hanging baskets must have motivated her to change her mind, because that week she got Dad and I to buy flowers to plant by the front walk. Dad and I had laughed because she had been so sure before that she didn’t need any flowers planted. She would go without flowers this year.
The day Dad and I planted the flowers I found two plants that had definitely seen better days. Since we were getting rid of the old and planting the new, I asked Nana what she wanted me to do with them. She told me she was just going to throw them away, but if I wanted to bring them home to see if I could bring them back to life, I could. She and Dad found two large pots that were full of old dirty soil for me to put the plants in. Dad and I repotted the dying plants into the pots taking out most of the old soil and filling it with new. That afternoon I loaded the big planters into the trunk of my car. That week Nana began the grueling task of cancer treatments.
Over the next few months Nana went through rounds of chemo. Her team of doctors were preparing her body for a stem cell transplant. Once the chemo did its job of putting the cancer into remission, they would begin the transplant process. Meanwhile I wasn’t fairing so well with the plants. I watered them, I talked to them, and once I even danced around them. None of that worked. The plants were just as dormant as they had been when I brought them home, actually I think I had succeeded in finishing the poor things off. I obviously do not have Nana’s green thumb, but mostly I think I don’t have her patience with growing things.
There was nothing left to do but put the poor things out of their misery. When I pulled the plants out of the pots they were completely dried and the roots were all shriveled up. I threw them over the fence into the horse pasture, telling them I was sorry and giving them a second of silence. Now I had two huge empty pots sitting by my front door. I wanted to keep the pots for future plants and I was sure I could use the potting soil in the future also. A few months later I hauled the large pots around back and put then up against the house, not planning on using them again until next year.
During the time of Nana’s treatments she was pretty much homebound and would be, even for months after the stem cell transplant, due to her low immune system. This gave her a lot of time for self-reflection. Sometimes this can be a good thing, and sometimes it can be a bad thing. For Nana it seemed to be a good thing. It became clear that as the drugs were killing everything old in her body to get ready for the new, she was already springing forth new life spiritually and emotionally. Nana was growing stronger in her relationship with Christ every day.
In a nutshell Nana’s stem-cell transplant was a re-birthing process. I looked up the definition of re-birth in the Webster’s dictionary. The second definition of re-birth simply reads “A revival”. I wanted to dig a little deeper so I looked up the meaning of revival. The first definition was “An act of reviving or the state of being revived. I liked the second one also, “A new presentation, as of an old film.” Well you know at this point I had to read on and see what it said for revive and there it was, the second definition, “To impart new health, vigor, or spirit to.”
Nana’s spirit life was definitely new and revived and she wanted more. It was the health part that we were worried about. Nana went through two cycles of taking med’s that depleted her system completely so that the end result would be a complete re-birth of blood cells in her body. Her cell system would be starting new again, just like a newborn child.
One day while Nana was in the hospital having the transplant I walked behind the house to turn the water faucet on. I couldn’t believe it! There in one of the pots was a green shoot! I bent down to touch it and tell it hello. Tears came to my eyes. “oh, Nana” I said, “It’s growing out of the old just like you.” I had almost thrown that old dirt out because I didn’t think it was capable of bringing forth new life. I thought the pot was empty, dead, no life in it. Boy was I wrong. I started watering the plant and as the weeks went on I couldn’t believe my eyes. I smile every time I see it, and I can’t help but think of Nana.
As the first purple blooms started coming out I noticed that something was eating on my plant. I got a little worried. I was attached to this little plant. It was fighting to grow just like Nana’s new cells. I kept a check on it every day, pulling off the leaves that had been chewed on, and watering it the days it didn’t rain. I talked to this plant (Making sure no one was around besides my two-year old) willing it to grow big and strong and resist the pesky bugs that were chewing on it, whatever they were.
That little green shoot is now a beautiful purple flowering vine. It’s not just a new life in an old pot, it’s taking over! It’s huge and beautiful. I’m going to have to stick a climber in the pot for it to grow up because it just keeps growing and growing. It’s funny to think that empty pot sat in the front yard all summer with no sign of life in it and now it’s over flowing with life.
Nana’s body is still fighting to grow, but it’s wonderful to see the beautiful person she has become. I don’t know what the days will bring for Nana’s physical body, but I do know she is in
God’s hands and I couldn’t think of a more wonderful, peaceful place to be. I like to think that in the near future she’s going to be shooting up and overflowing with life just like the new plant in my backyard. I look forward to the day when Nana is well enough to come and see the beautiful vine that I now call “My purple Nana”. Isaiah 26:3-4 You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast, because he trusts in you. Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord, the Lord, is the Rock eternal. NIV
