Ghost Orchid, Part II

Since 2024, Refusal to Bloom

I am the Ghost Orchid

In my last issue of this newsletter, I reported the popular ghost orchid in the Everglades has not bloomed since 2024. So, readers, anything happen in 2024 that possibly would cause a plant to give up the ghost? (I wish it was funny but alas…)

From WGCU.org: Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary: “Popular ghost orchid pauses its spirited bloom.”

1998 The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean, Ballentine Books

Yes, this is the orchid that was the main character in Susan Orleans 1998 book: The Orchid Thief: A True Story of Beauty & Obsession, and in 2002, the movie Adaptation. Orleans travelled to Florida where she reported on the story of John Laroche and his orchid poaching escapades.

The Orchid Thief is personal journalism at its best and summarized as “folding virtue and criminality around profit.”

Sound familiar—like profiting off the caging of human beings?

The rare ghost orchid is a harbinger. A warning. When indigenous plants in the Everglades refuse to bloom, where Alligator Alcatraz is a for profit venture, a poisonous environment exists which is not fit for human habitation.

The stench of the fumes of virtue, caging immigrants for our own good, the evil of criminality and profit—all unacceptable.

The plants know what to do—refuse to acquiesce. Refuse to bloom.

I refuse to accept. I write about what I see. I pay attention.

What have you seen? Let me know in the COMMENTS. Together is the only way to move forward.

Thank you for subscribing to Get Gutsy. Your encouragement means the world to me.

Remember, There’s No Expiration on Dreams,

Trish

Link to my novel, Paper Bags: https://woodhallpress.com/paper-bags