Presbyterian Daylilies

Daylilies are forever. They bloom in the hottest part of the Oklahoma summer, bright orange blossoms that last for one day. But because each stem can have more than one flower, they seem to bloom for weeks, never defeated by intense heat or drought, and always back the next year. Good luck trying to clear a flowerbed of daylilies. You may be absolutely positive that you've dug up every single tuber, but when spring comes, so will daylilies.

Daylilies are part of my heritage, a part I failed to appreciate during most of my growing-up years in Kansas. Daylilies were ubiquitous in the ditches along the roads of my childhood. I saw them from the backseat of the family car as we went to 4-H meetings, church, to town to see my grandparents. They grew near abandoned farmhouses or places where the house had disappeared or where people during the 1930s had planted them as erosion control. One of the local names for the daylily is "ditchlily."

My most vivid memory of daylilies are those that grew--and still do--beside the First Presbyterian Church in Oskaloosa, Kansas. They grew along the fence between the church and the house next door and along the edge of what used to be the manse garage. They crowded the fence and truly did seem to bloom all summer because there were so many of them.

After college graduation, David and I moved to Tulsa and my Kansas trips became infrequent. But as my parents aged, I began to visit more often.  When I went to church with them, which was every Sunday I was there, I'd have time to visit before and after church, to listen to stories and to appreciate my heritage, including those daylilies.

One Sunday, I mentioned the flowers to Betty, an accomplished gardener who volunteered her talents to the church. She sighed and said she really needed to divide the massive fence row of daylilies and asked if I'd like to have some. Yes, I would. We had recently moved to a new house and I was looking for easy-to-grow flowers.

On one of my subsequent trips, I gathered an armload of daylilies and put them in the trunk of my car. Mom was pleased. Those daylilies, she said, were Mrs. Swoyer's pride and joy because of their double blooms. I hadn't noticed. I have a vague childhood memory of Mrs. Swoyer, who I think was about my grandmother's age.

Those daylilies have been in my garden now for fourteen years, never failing to emerge each spring from the ground, blooming in the deadliest heat and driest years. Their companion plant is blue salvia, another beautiful survivor. Like Betty, I've divided them and given them to friends, even to the local nursery.

Unlike daylilies, people and institutions, even churches, aren't forever. The daylillies in my garden represent my heritage: not only the church, but also the people who loved me, encouraged me and cheered me on as I went away to college, married, moved away and achieved my goal of becoming a teacher. Most of these people are now gone, but the flowers remind me of their strength and inner beauty, surviving the Depression, WWII, innumerable griefs and setbacks, never giving up, always returning, drawing strength from their community and celebrating the ordinary beauty of everyday life.

The Oskaloosa Presbyterian Church building is still on the corner where it has stood for more than 100 years. The congregation, however, is dwindling, down to a few who faithfully attend service every Sunday. Someday the congregation will be gone and the building sold.

But those daylilies will be still there, growing, spreading, crowding the fence, always returning, symbols of the unyielding determination, eternal hope and faith in the future the Presbyterians bequeathed to me and to others of my generation.