When I was very first taking an interest in gardening, Nice Former Teacher let me "steal" a few of her hens'n'chicks. She had a half-wine barrel overflowing with them; said she'd had them forever, they didn't need anything except to be left alone, and if I could manage to do that they would multiply like crazy.
Almost three years later, today I repotted some of the descendants of those original plants. They've been among my favorites, and are probably the oldest thing I've got growing. (Translation: They're gorgeous in the winter, and I haven't killed them yet!)
As I was repotting, I, like Nice Teacher before me, found that I had way too many. As I started thinking about how long I've had them, and how long Nice Teacher had had them, and how long the person before her had probably had them . . . well, it just didn't feel right to just throw the extras away--that's a lot of history, after all. So, I potted them up to take to work and give away. I can't figure out if that means I'm paying-it-forward or paying-it-back, but either way it feels good to pass along a pass along.
