Pink Lady Slipper

I'm sure I've mentioned (oh, about eleventy-million times) that as a young girl I spent many a spring and summer week at my Grandma's house in the Iowa woodlands. Regardless of the season, we would often walk the woods and creek, but in the spring wildflowers were our first priority.

There were certain flowers that were the old standby (Spring Beauties, Sweet William, Dutchman's Brithces). Certain flowers that only grew in one area (Virginia Bluebells, Buttercups) and some that we rarely or never found.

My Grandma often talked about Lady Slippers--both yellow and pink. We'd search for either, and never found either while we together. I believe she once found a yellow Lady Slipper when I wasn't there, but the Pink Lady Slipper was somewhat our Holy Grail so to speak--something we searched for and never found.

I'd never seen one before last weekend. On our fated Bear-Poop hike I saw what had elluded me for so many years. Something I'd very nearly forgotten about--until I saw a clump of these pink beauties at the edge of a trail deep in the Smoky Mountains.



Just as normal as could be, their pink little heads stood there at the side of the trail as my breath caught in my throat. I couldn't help but look up at the sky through the trees and feel my Grandma hiking along with me. Surely she saw it too.