June 6, 2025

Good morning!

It’s Friday. And unlike yesterday’s mystery flowers, which Bear insists he didn’t plant, I know exactly where these hellebores—or “lenten roses”—came from and how they ended up where they did.

For a long time, my aunt Judy has tended a thriving patch of lenten roses in her Michigan garden. I tried to get some established in our garden the year we moved in, and I very much failed. Since then, I always cringe when I see them at the garden store.

Last fall, my aunt Judy dug up a fresh clump from her patch, washed off all traces of soil, teased apart the rhizomes until she had several small, promising specimens, and hand carried them on a plane—two planes, actually—all the way to me here in Maine.

She studied the yard, pointed to a spot, and said, “There!” In they went. She watered them and she must’ve whispered secret spells into their tiny green ears, because after fall and winter and spring, look what’s growing.

“You can have more than one home. You can carry your roots with you, and decide where they grow.”

—Henning Mankell

Respiteers, shall we gather at 2pm EDT to discuss roots? As always, check your inbox right before the hour for your magic link.

Onwards we go,

Clara