flowers of sarajevo

tuesday evening i'm driving to the provo temple when i get a text message. i love getting text messages. i don't care much for voice mails for whatever reason.
it's from a number i don't recognize: 'you might want to invest in a hose to water your flowers'

while i do my best to upkeep my little house, i know there are areas i miss--the dishes are piling a little high or the bathroom is overdue for a cleaning--but i couldn't think of any flowers we even had, much less ones that would be in an unsightly need of watering.

'i have flowers?'

'i see flowers, don't you?'

'not that i can think of. but then again, i'm not home right now'

'well well you need to check it out then'

i wondering if there would be a vase of flowers waiting for me on the front steps or something.

'perhaps, but i'm cautious about taking botanical advice from strange numbers.'

'but i have a green thumb'

i had reached the temple and had to end the conversation. i texted to mark about this situation, and he had receieved the same initial text and had also been carrying on a conversation with the mystery flower bearer.
so the simultaneous hope of a secret admirer and the dread of an over-zealous female admirer was partially dispersed, knowing that my roommate was an equal recipient/target.

coming out of the temple, i found a small note on my windshield, printed on a patterned stationary, eloquently stating that for my serving at the temple tonight, the river view ward young women had cleaned my windshied.

when i got home, mark suggested i go look out back.
now, our back yard is a sadly neglected part of our house--mark's combination grill and smoker usually sits in the middle of the concrete area, while weeds of all sizes grow in the sandy dirt by the house and also by the fence. it looks like the remnants of a crumbled civilization. i used to say it looked like sarajevo, but i really don't know what the bosnian capitol looks like; it's probably a nice and growing city [a quite google image searchs confirms that the latter is true].
i've sincerely been meaning to get out and at least weed our backyward lately.

but that was before.
the grill and related implements had been neatly arranged to one side. the dirty, dusty concrete had been swept clean. the patches of dirt were now edged with a simple brick wall [i don't remember if the wall was there before; if it was, it certainly wasn't as neatly alligned]. and the sections of dirt were now flower beds, with several little flowers planted with care. there was also a little tomato plant, as well as two more medium sized pot of flowers on the steps.

i didn't know what to think. it was beautiful. it was what i'd wanted to do with the yard since last summer.

i just wondered who did it and why?
mark and i discussed the usual suspects and potential motives. it seemed most logical that someone from our fhe group would do it, as we were out having a water balloon fight there just last week, so people could see our demilitarized yard. and, as i think about it, i remembed talking about how i wanted to prune and care for the poor little spot of land.
what concerned me was that it was some girl hoping to win one of our hearts. and while it is a truly impressive gesture, i'm not really interested in anyone i know, despite having a great respect and admiration for many of the potential gardners.
in discussing the mystery with my sister and her husband last night, the elements of the situation--mark and i both getting the same texts, there being no other clues as to how to find the person--it seems more likely that it was just someone doing a really rad act of kindness.

it's really cool. i love it.
now i have to go to wal-mart to buy a hose.