Then It Came Crashing Down...

You know the story. She huffed and she puffed and so forth. Live-blogging the hurricane, I watched as the queen palm inched her way down, agonizingly slowly. I signed off, saying the trees were about to come through the front window.


The queen palm came down on the orchid tree, and together they crashed onto the roof. Not through the window, however.


Instead, they hung precariously over the front door. Part of the mess was held in place by this orchid tree branch. Every time I tried to go in or out the front door it wobbled. In the opinion of FEMA Dave, however, this did not constitute a safety hazard.


It's hard to make out what's happening from the pix, as opposed to video, so here's a different angle. Some of the branches have been cleared; what's still there is dying. After the first week or so, the downed green vegetation started to turn, to brown or rot.


And yet? This orchid, from our friend Burke, was hanging off a branch of the orchid tree.

It's a vanda. That's a type of orchid that usually dies if one messes around with its roots. Orchids are amazingly sturdy plants; they can often take a lot of abuse - but vandas just hate to get messed with.

I couldn't even find it for days. Finally I did, and dug it out of the huge mess of debris, tossed it aside, then hung it up somewhere. It stayed there, ignored and uncared for. Then one day I walked out to do more of the endless cleanup and saw it had not only survived, but burst into bloom.

As if Burke was saying *hello!* to us, grinning that big grin he had...