Sonchus

What color is the… yikes.

—Jig3125

Sometimes a question begins innocently.

“What color is the…”

Then you see it.

Yikes.

Question canceled.

No further information required.

That’s the funny thing about curiosity.

It sounds harmless when you start.

You look.

You wonder.

You ask.

Then reality decides to answer before you’re ready.

Sonchus, for example, doesn’t exactly scream danger.

It’s a plant.

A wild one.

Green stems.

Leaves.

Yellow flowers.

Pretty ordinary, depending on your relationship with weeds.

But plants have a funny habit of reminding us that nature doesn’t care what we consider ordinary.

A flower can be beautiful.

A leaf can be edible.

A stem can be irritating.

And something that looks harmless can still make you pause before touching it.

“What color is the…”

Yikes.

The smartest response to curiosity isn’t always an answer.

Sometimes it’s:

“Don’t touch that.”

A little observation.

A little distance.

A little respect for the fact that nature has been experimenting much longer than we have.

Sonchus grows.

We look.

We wonder.

We ask.

And every once in a while…

we wisely stop asking.

— JIG3125