GET ALL THE FACTS FIRST

When we bought this home three years ago, we noticed the cactus-y plants at the end of the driveway, just beyond a beautiful hedge of pink and white oleanders. The cactus-y plants remind me of giant octopuses, and they're not my favorite plants.

Last spring, Milton was working in the yard and came running inside. "Come see what's happening to one of those plants by the driveway!"

I ran outside and saw a tall skinny pole-like thing growing out of the middle of one of the cactus-y plants. It was about six feet tall. "What in the world?" I said.

"Isn't that weird looking?" he said. "It wasn't there yesterday. It grew overnight."

Amazingly, the next day, it was taller, and the next day, taller still. Every day it grew a few more feet, reminding us of the story of Jack and the Beanstalk. One day, one of the neighbors exclaimed, "That's a century plant, and it's fixing to bloom! They bloom once in their lifetime, usually when the plant is anywhere from 15 to 25 years old!"

The pole thing kept growing until it was past telephone pole height. We googled "Century Plant" and learned that it would bloom with yellow blooms sometime in the summer, is found predominantly in New Mexico and Arizona, and is what tequilla is made from.

We kept watching, and sure enough, the top sprouted yellow blooms. Nice. Unique. A fun thing to watch and talk about all those months.

A fitting correlation to many things in life...it takes time to achieve the best in something...like in marriage...or in your career...or in a relationship, etc.

***

But...Google also said the plant dies after it blooms. Further research said the plant would rot and stink if it wasn't taken down quickly enough.

So a couple of weeks ago, Milton puts on a sweatshirt to protect his arms from the awful thorns on the plant and goes out to cut it down. He works and works and works, sweating like all get out as he cuts off the "arms." But he realizes the stump and root will need to be removed with a chain saw and more manpower. He calls a deacon in our church (we pastor a church) and asks if he has an hour or so to help him in the next couple of weeks, and shortly, that heart-of-gold deacon is standing in our yard sawing down the stump, with Milton stacking it neatly by the curb in the correct lengths for pickup on yard trash day. In short order, they pull the massive root out of the ground via a rope tied to Deacon's pickup truck, and the project is completed.

The lesson here? I'm always looking for lessons in things, I guess because I was raised this way, with my mother always saying, "Well, next time, do this (whatever), and it'll turn out better." In other words, What can I learn from this experience to make it better the next time I do it? A good way to look at things.

The lesson? Teamwork, I suppose. And that can be applied to many things in life.

***

But...Deacon's wife calls Monday morning and asks if Milton's legs are "eat up?" Deacon's legs are covered in an angry red rash, she tells me, and I report that no, Milton doesn't have a rash. She says she researched and found that the Century Plant is toxic. Apparently, the sawdust hit Deacon's legs (he was wearing shorts) as he sawed the trunk down. Wednesday night at church, Deacon pulls up his pants leg, and I about faint. It looks like ten thousand ants have bitten him. Oh, my. I felt terrible for him.

I'm not sure what lesson I see in this, unless it's to know all the facts before doing something, and to research thoroughly and get advice before doing something new-to-you.

***

Thank God for heart-of-gold deacons and church people. You can depend on them. "Let me know when your other Century Plants need taken down," he recently said.