Stolen Oranges are Sweeter

Today, we took a drive. There is a station of a renowned agricultural research center close enough to our house, we might could hit it with a rock. Today they had an open tour of their camellia gardens. I have never seen a camellia garden, but I do enjoy botanical shows and sales, so I cajoled my boys into going with me. Camellias are not my favorites, but they are lovely. A cross between a rose and a carnation and a peony. In this garden, they had collected a veritable red, pink, and white rainbow of varieties. We were particularly enthralled with this one that Brother nicknamed "the candy cane flowers."


We explored.

(picture of mama and baby removed)

We examined.

(picture of brother removed)

There were gallons of blooms still on the tree/bush creations, reaching their loose tight heads for a kiss of sunshine and a visit from a pollinator. But there were also fallen angels among the pine needles...


...that could be scooped up into a pocket to be sprinkled in our own sleeping flower beds,

... for no other purpose than a little boy's amusement at bringing home treasure.

They did have camellias for sale, but the price for the five gallon bucket was a little to rich for my blood. Instead we spent much of our visit in thievery. I noticed a seedling smaller than my hand next to a vibrant red bush and tugged its roots from the soil, wrapped them in a maple leaf and placed the plant in my back pocket. I told my Honey how I was like his Granny, who boasts of plucking beautiful plants in her yard as seeds or newborns from this place or another. The new little plant is in a pot now on my front porch. We were not the only ones engaged in this. I saw a man using his pocket knife to saw off a bud of a sparsely flowered, yet insanely purple bloomed bush. I am guessing this is where the seed was hidden?

But on the way out, there was an orange grove where the trees were so heavily fruited, the limbs were weighed down. I glanced out of the back windshield to look for official types and then told Honey to hop and and pick us some oranges. He grabbed three bright orbs before diving back into the car and pulling away. We teased each other and Brother about coming back with pillow sacks in the middle of the night to liberate the trees of their burdens.

When I got home and Brother, with a glint in his eye, talked about how we stole those oranges, I tried to come up with a good reason why we had done it and how it fit into the We never steal rule. I hemmed and hawed and finally told him that it didn't fit. There was no excusing it. And left it at that. I sliced deeply into the colored flesh and we all tasted the sunshine-made-food. It is true. Stolen oranges really are sweeter.