I've been EVERMORE'd

There’s a scene in Alice in Wonderland where the White Rabbit oversees the playing cards as they frantically paint tulips. Yes, paint them. Because they’re supposed to be RED, not white, and the Queen of Hearts will holler: “off with their heads” if any white flowers besmirch her garden.

It’s possible the White Rabbit has visited my garden lately.

My other theory is that I’ve been Evermore’d, because when I arrived home from my weekend in Boston, this is what I saw:

What is that RED tulip doing there? I don’t remember much from high school biology, but according to Gregor Mendal’s genetic experiments with pea plants, can the recessive alleles of PINK tulips produce red ones? Okay, I guess I remembered more than I thought – but I still don’t think it’s possible.

I’m quite positive that I only planted PINK. There’s no reason I’d plant any other color – pink tulips are my favorite flowers. They were only one I’d consider for my wedding five years ago, and when every florist I consulted turned me down (“They’ll wilt in Pennsylvanian July heat”) I had 800 flown in from the Netherlands. Sidenote: They didn’t wilt.

So how did these interlopers get in my garden? If it were just one tulip, I’d blame it on a rogue bulb planted by a squirrel, but check this out:

This is the view around the side of my house. I counted, there are 11 garden-crashing tulips. St. Matt didn’t plant them; he’s not the type to plant surprise flowers and certainly not red ones. This is our fourth spring in the house, so I doubt they’ve been lying dormant this long.

The only explanation I can come up with is Damen read how Jace had recently replaced him as my Distraction Fairy. Clearly, Damen stopped by and decided to assert his dominance by planting red tulips in my garden.

Sorry, Damen & Jace – I picked up my copy of Fragile Eternity today; now you’ve both got to compete with Seth for the title.

As for the rogue rouge tulips…. Anyone have any pink paint?