[The Blog - Week 13]

This post comes to you from a rare weekend off from band. Our next game cycle is a three-week turnaround, which gives us room to breathe (and dig into more complicated music and drill).

Last week’s game? Wild. It was Taylor’s first Gopher football experience, and he described it as “strange.” I have to agree! We won 66–0, with the team scoring before I even made it back outside after the pregame show.

We had sunny skies until the very end. Lightning rolled in, the game was paused, and eventually called off. No postgame show for the band, and worse… the tubas didn’t get to play shorts. Tragic, truely.

Outside of band, not much happened this week… unless you count school work, work-work, date nights, and my first quiz-day-Friday in Russian—so, a lot, I suppose.

A lot has been going on around campus as well—strikes, threats, news—it’s been heavy. I’ve been keeping my head down and focusing on what I can control. Maybe that’s not brave, but it feels like the best choice for me at the moment.

I’d say more on this topic, but I would much rather tell you about my plant.

Last November, I stole a bunch of succulents from my parents’ collection. The plan was to rehome them in these 'mythical hanging glass orbs' I got off the internet and give them away as Christmas gifts.

I ordered four orbs: two were successfully gifted, while the others arrived broken.

One only had a busted loop—so I kept it for myself as a fancy little glass pot. I put a plant in it and kept her by my window.

By April, she had outgrown her home—so much so that I had to smash the glass just to get her out. It was a difficult task—my hands were shaking, partly from the usual end-of-day fatigue, but mostly because of the news I’d gotten earlier.

The history department had rejected my grant application—months of hard work with no tangible reward. I was just as crushed as the shards of the once-mythic orb.

I got my plant out safely, though she snapped clean in half while I was repotting her. Cursing the carelessness that came with my grief, and feeling guilty for harming another life, I hastily buried both halves in a bigger plastic receptacle.

Back in the window she went, left to grow—or not—while I pushed forward, forgetting about both the plant and the grant in the relentless waves of schoolwork.

After all, I was still really excited about going to Germany.

A week later, I got an unexpected email. The original grant recipient had a change of plans—the opportunity was mine if I still wanted it.

It reminded me of my Make-A-Wish trip years ago. Originally, I was told I wasn’t sick enough to qualify—a point I tried to take comfort in, even as my heart ached with disappointment. But later, we learned there had been a mix-up and I had been sent the wrong letter.

Now, like then, my attitude flipped in an instant. Swept up in the excitement, I began canceling appointments, drafting my two weeks’ notice, and postponing a surgery I’d scheduled for June.

Sometime later that week, I looked at my plant again. The top half—the part I thought would thrive—had withered. But the bottom half sprouted a tiny, strange little flower off to the side. It wasn't much, but it was alive, and it was growing.

April, 2025

I left her with my parents during my travels this summer and just picked her up yesterday. She’s unrecognizable. The frankenplant has grown massive and beautiful. You can still see where she broke—and where she began again. Her petals glow green at the base, changing suddenly into a rich purple at the tips. The scarred stem holds the vibrant bloom high, even as the original leaves wither and fall away.

Sept, 2025

Though her appearance has changed, and despite not growing in the direction anyone expected, she is thriving—supported by the memory of her past.

Perhaps I am reading too much into it, but I see much in my little plant.

This week, I’m choosing to grow like a succulent. My current grant application is nearly complete—I have my campus interview on Thursday. I don’t have high expectations, but you’ll never achieve if you don’t try… or something of that nature, anyways.

Until next week,

Hannah