It's life, Jim

There is much scientific debate about what constitutes life, and when it is that something can be classed as alive rather than as just a bunch of chemicals that might replicate given the right circumstances.   But it's not so difficult as all that.  If you want to see and touch something that sits on the border between the living and the inert, just order cheap plants from a mail order catalogue, and wait to see what comes in the post.

These day lillies arrived by post three years ago and this is the first time that they are showing signs of being flowering plants.  Day lillies really need to be massed in big clumps, since, the flowers being open for only a day, you need a lot of them to give a continuous display.  These are not clumps yet, but I live in patient hope.  Meanwhile, the flowers give promise of a pretty display in the fulness of time.