Mission Moment: Cross Pollination

Recently my wife and I were driving outside of Waynesboro when we saw a sign that said "Day Lilies". Being one of our favorite plants we stopped, drove down a steep driveway, followed the signs to park in the grass, and then walked down to an amazing site.

Their, terraced in beds that rolled gently down to a pond, were thousands of day lilies. The colors were profuse from deep red to pink to salmon to purple to butter yellow to chartreuse. The petals were tight and full, some were like velvet, others were like spider legs while others doubled over on themselves like roses.

Each one was beautiful and unique. Thousands of bees hovered from flower to flower while wind chimes gently responded to the cooling breeze. It was breathtaking.

The owner of the garden walked us through and showed us her favorites. As we discussed which ones we wanted for our garden, she began explaining how she develops different types of day lilies. I had been thinking for years that because day lilies grow from a type of bulb known as a rhizome, that only the most skilled of horticulturists could possibly grow a day lily from seed. The garden, a retired professor, with the glint of "ah, a new opportunity to teach" smiled at me, laughed casually and said. "Oh I thought that too. But look."

She then walked to plant in bloom and pulled a stamen (the part that has dusty pollen on it) and walked over to another plant and rubbed it on the stigma (the female part of the flower that leads to the ovaries where the seeds are developed). "Okay, I'm done." Amazed and puzzled I asked what about the bees? "Oh, they do their job too, but they may not get from this flower here to that flower there, so I do that."

When asked to see her results, she first picked an unripened seed pod, opened it up, and showed me the hundreds of seeds waiting to mature. She then spread her arm in an arch encompassing all of the flowers saying "Here you are. From this," holding the pod,"to this," showing the garden. "The exact results are never guaranteed, but some will bear beautiful, new, and unique flowers that have never existed before." She was right, the diversity of beauty in the garden was clear.

As we left with our new plants for our garden and headed back to Savannah, I got to thinking. I had always assumed that only the most skilled of trained professionals could create a hybrid. I also thought that the bees naturally did all that was needed to make new plants. And, of course, my thoughts then drifted to the Y and our kids.

If we rely on the culture surrounding a child to "pollinate" his or her mind we will get results fairly similar to what is already there. But if we can introduce other elements from other cultures, who knows how that child will blossom?

We are so thankful for our volunteers who bring new ideas, cultures, experiences, and thoughts to our children. Our volunteers have many different skills, but none of them would consider themselves experts. What they all have in common is a desire and the courage to love a child.

We already see buds of potential beauty and diversity in our kids. When they rally around one of our autistic children to help him keep with the group, or when they console someone who is sad, or when they create wonderful art expressing their joy when months ago they wouldn't even talk to us, we see the buds. We can't wait for the full flower.

And are excited to know that the fruit they will bear in future generations will be even more diverse and wonderful than what we see now. All thanks to the volunteers who made the time to give of what they had to a child from another garden.