Here's to Hope

by Emily Conrad


Inspired by my mom, whose orchid plant rebloomed after years of faithfully administering ice cubes each week, I invested in some orchids of my own.

When I bring an orchid plant home from the grocery store, it’s full of beautiful buds. Whether we’re talking aspirations or orchid plants (or both), it takes that initial promise to get us started, doesn’t it?

The beauty draws us in. Enraptured, we vow we’re going to care for it and see this through. But then the flowers shrivel. The flower spike hardens and dries. The leaves stay green, but is anything going on in there? Weeks stretch to years.

But to the persistent, the story isn’t over.
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