Attack of the garden

How not to grow daylilies, and other insights

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Many years ago, I worked for my father in his bold venture: a movie production company in Hollywood. With no experience as a professional writer, playwright, or producer, he dove in headfirst, chasing a dream as audacious as it was inspiring.

Before this, my father lived a vibrant, adventurous life, trying his hand at farming, preaching, missionary work, car sales, business consulting, and crafting bespoke leather goods. His most transformative pursuit came during the middle of his life, when he shifted from minister to artist—a change I believe sprang from his deep yearning to help.

Though self-taught, he became a master leather craftsman, renowned for bespoke holsters, belts, purses, briefcases, cowboy hats, and vests. His dye work, blending golden and rose hues into rich mahogany and walnut shades, turned hides into art. He progressed from simple tooled designs (stamped into wet leather) to hand-drawn, carved, and airbrushed masterpieces, all while running his business from our home during my high school years. There, he also began writing his first screenplay, a tale inspired by real-life events involving ghosts, reincarnation, and treasure hunting (intriguing, no?). Many afternoons, I’d come home from school to read his latest pages, thrilled to watch his story unfold day by day.

At his core, he was a risk-taker, chasing bold, sometimes unconventional dreams, each tied to a heartfelt desire to improve the world for others. If anyone poured their heart into that mission, he did. Even his screenplay carried a message of hope, suggesting life extends beyond the material world.

After high school, I joined his newly launched production company in a beautiful office at the historic corner of Hollywood and Vine. As his secretary and receptionist, I greeted many strangers—dreamers like us—who came through our door with headshots and resumes. A true southern gentleman, my dad welcomed each stranger with coffee, a chat, and genuine curiosity about their lives and aspirations, often exploring whether they might join his team.

Those years were golden, filled with strangers becoming friends and friends finding solace in our little oasis of kindness amid Hollywood’s tough, often heartbreaking industry. Dad shared his vision for his movie, buoyed by their enthusiasm, and we forged lasting friendships—some of the best of our lives. Though we never secured funding for his film (which I have come to believe was actually a blessing), our presence there served a greater purpose in our own lives and the lives of others. So, Dad, mission accomplished!

Dad also wrote poetry; this poem he dedicated to me:

Little Dreamer

Go little dreamer dream your dreams

Just remember: they’re life.

Find your times of happiness

Heal your wounds from strife.


Dreams are for those who need and seek

Balms for wounds and woes.

Remember little dreamer, life’s dilemmas

Are not to you unique.


So dream your dreams little dreamer.

In them your happiness find.

For they can become more solid and real

Than the lurking shadows of your mind.

I’ve often shared how Dad embraced my dreams, urging me to dream as big as my heart could bear. That idea—dreaming boldly, even beyond what seems possible—shaped me early on, and I carry it forward, sharing it with others to this day.

In my original blog, I wrote often about dreams and goals, especially in May 2007, when I was living the early days of a big life dream. In a post titled “Dream Like No One is Watching,” I shared this snapshot of my thoughts:

“I have a theory about dreams—perhaps I’ve shared it before, I don’t recall. Here it is: a person should dream, and dream big. I think it’s rare any of us exceed our dreams in life, so we may as well dream as big, as bold, as lovely as possible. Aim high, and then higher, with your dreams. What do you have to lose? Dream like no one is watching and then dream a bit further still.

“After all, three* years ago, standing on a hot, dry road on a hillside in Southern California, I dreamed of living on a farm.”

(*At the time I wrote this blog post this was excerpted from, it had been three years … now it has been twenty.)

Not all my dreams have worked out, in fact some have failed.  My best example of one of my failures was the dream of creating a Daylily Farm. That vision turned into a nightmare because I dove in face-first, starry-eyed, with no clue what flower farming entailed and whether I was actually cut out for that kind of work (hint: I wasn’t).

The dream began when I was enchanted by the fantastic beauty of daylilies I saw at a local garden. One year later I made what seemed like a modest purchase of 55 daylily plants, and chose one acre of our farm for creating my garden.  I waited nearly a year for the first blooms, but as the plants grew, so did weeds, grasses, and all sorts of unwelcome invaders. I spent hours and hours on my hands and knees, battling to keep them at bay.

Undaunted that first year, I added another hundred or so plants, not realizing I was multiplying the weeding along with the daylilies, and the weeds outnumbered the daylilies by orders of magnitude, demanding constant vigilance.

Mother Nature, it turns out, has a knack for throwing curveballs from year to year. The next season, the explosion of weeds overtook my acre of dreams with such ferocity I struggled to even find my daylily plants amid the overgrown chaos. Even armed with a weed whacker, I was out-manned (figuratively), engaged in a battle against an overwhelming enemy in a war of futility. For every weed I whacked or pulled, another fifty to a hundred seemed to spring up.

That dream was beautiful but naive—my estimate of the effort involved was wildly off. Looking back, I can laugh at my ignorance, though at the time, it felt like a nightmare. 

Astonishingly, the following year, I nearly added 400 more plants because the supplier, going out of business, offered a deal I thought I couldn’t refuse. 

I’m stunned now that I even considered it, and incredibly grateful that I finally left that battlefield behind!  Sometimes the things you think you want are not the things you need, and the things you think you need are not the things you want.

Although that dream did become a nightmare, I don’t regret one moment of the living of it.  It was hard work, there were many tears, but I’m proud of what I tried to do and that I took it on even though I wasn’t made for that task.  It was probably entertaining to some of our neighbors to see me out there whenever the weed wars broke out.

By the way, I do maintain a manageable daylily garden close to the house with about a dozen plants that have given me gorgeous blooms for many years now.  In fact, they just got started with this summer’s bloomers and I am excited to greet them as they come alive. 

Hey, Dad … if you’re watching over me (and I think you are), if you hear my voice in the ether (which I believe you do), some of those dreams became goals, some goals led to plans, and some plans worked out.

Life isn’t perfect, but I’m happy in the ways that matter most. I owe so much to you—you believed in me, no matter what I chased. For every creation, invention, painting, and word, you were there, cheering me on.

Thank you, Dad … I’ll always remember and love you.

To all of you listening to the podcast or reading this blog, I wish you so well and I hope you have fun dreaming and experience the gratification of making those most dear to your heart come true.

Until next time, this is … ~ firefly, out.