...and yes, I do know it usually comes before a fall....

This is an Arbutus A Umberto – commonly known as the Strawberry Tree. It’s a really lovely evergreen plant that is flowering now and the fertilised flowers will bear fruit next autumn.

So why have I been out and braved the cold and dark to find a cluster of flowers and brought them in to photograph?

Well, this sixteenth day of my advent tale, reflecting on my year is the day that I have had final confirmation of the greatest honour I think I have ever received and all through a chance meeting in the summer.

I have the honour of speaking at the Philadelphia Flower Show in March of next year. Why me? I’m not a horticulturalist and I have nothing to sell to horticulturalists (which, judging by the general correspondence to speakers, many are). I just have a love of my garden and a love of plants.

Since I got back into photography, I have always spent my time in the garden with a camera on a tripod while I work. When I see something that strikes me as beautiful, I nip over to wherever my camera is, collect it and take a photo. I’ve been doing it for eighteen months now. I have posted many of the photos in galleries here on pbase.

In the summer of this year, I met two of the most amazing women I have ever encountered and, although separated by the Atlantic Ocean, I will love those two women for ever. I refer, of course, to Patti and Sally, our houseguests from July.

Unbeknown to me, Sally turned out to be a real, living, breathing horticulturalist and my love for her started at the moment we met when I realised she had philadelphus flowers laced through her hair and lavender threaded into the button holes on her blouse. She works for the Philadelphia Horticultural Society and runs urban garden projects – she takes horticulture into inner-city areas and helps ordinary people to develop a love of plants. She also manages the show, along with her colleague.

Strangely, she wanted me to do a slot in the lecture theatre at the show but I thought she was joking. She wasn’t! She meant it. I keep thinking they will suddenly realise I’m just an ordinary girl with no horticultural talent at all and not the pro photographer that she might have mistakenly believed me to be. I’ve tried to explain all of this to her but to no avail. So, in mid-March, I will stand up in front of 400 or so people in a foreign country and speak about a subject that I love with a passion, though am a complete amateur and all because of Sally.

I keep pinching myself but I’m not dreaming, it’s really happening to me. I’m excited and nervous all at the same time and I’m so humbled by being asked that I still keep thinking they will contact me soon and tell me it’s all a big mistake and they really meant someone else.

So, me – an ‘attraction’ at the biggest flower show in the world (see Sally, I did take that on board)………..how scary/spooky/marvellous/terrifying/awe inspiring/wonderful is that?