I wrote here about how sometimes weeds turn out to be flowers. Morning glories exemplify this. Their vines don’t look like much and could easily be mistaken for something you want to uproot quickly. Indeed, they are considered invasive by many gardeners, being “volulnteer” plants that appear unasked and grow quickly, sometimes choking out the ones you have planned to grow. They also often appear in “un-garden-like” settings. I first became fond of them several years ago when I was homeschooling Jake for the first time. Jake appears to be the only one of my children who shares my interest in horticulture/botany. I often point out various bushes or trees to my kids and mention what they are called, eliciting yawns from all of them except Jake.
Anyway, we used to go walking in lieu of physical education, and we liked to walk the alleys of our urban neighborhood. This was pre-cellphone camera so I don’t have any pictures to show you how amazingly the coming of the morning glories transformed garbage-strewn alleys into wonderland. You see, morning glories can grow anywhere, especially thriving in poor soils and full sun, and they festooned the chain link and blanketed the trash cans. They came in pink, blue, purple, and white, some with different colored centers. I always wished to have some of my own.
And guess what! A month or so ago I noticed familiar heart-shaped leaves appearing on a small vine twining up the one bit of chain link fence that remains attached to the side of our house, where the garbage cans unfortunately are prominently placed for easy emptying. I thought I knew what they were and Jake and I twined the vine through the fence as it grew. It covered the fence and is now rewarding us with our very own morning glory (isn’t that a beautiful name?) that blooms for a few hours each morning.
[Update: At our current house, morning glories liberally adorn the side of the house around the AC units, and have taken over the fall garden as well because I don’t have the heart to pull them up.]
