This, I believe, is a jade plant in bloom. It’s on the side of the building where where my walk first joins the sidewalk. I don’t believe I have ever seen a jade plant bloom, though it must be an annual event. A profusion of tiny white flowers.

My grandmother had one, my Welsh grandmother, in other words my father’s mother, at the back door leading to the kitchen. It was about four feet tall and unusual in appearance. In those days you visited relatives by going in the back door and yelling something like, “Hi grandma, it’s Evan.” And my grandmother would come running to say, “Oh dear, I have nothing to serve you.” And so would begin the ritual of preparing tea, and sandwiches, and scones, and biscuits, and a hundred other things she didn’t have. I’m not sure that such hospitality exists today. Nor do I know of a single back door I’m allowed to walk through.

In high school I took my Danish girlfriend Karen to meet her. My grandfather died in Wales. It was my thirteenth birthday, so she’d lived alone for many years. They seemed like peas in a pod, and yet totally different. They were both people you'd want to know and visit, always up to the task of company. And they got on very well.

But before opening the back door we stopped. Karen was taken by the strange plant next to the door and three steps down. She had never seen anything like it. It was completely covered in what looked like tea leaves. Leaves in all shades of brown. I said, “Watch. In a few seconds she’ll put the kettle on. She’ll say, ‘Oh dear, I have nothing to serve you.’ Then she’ll rinse out the tea pot with hot water, and without looking march to the back door, turn to the side and empty the pot with her left hand. The old tea leaves will land right on top of the jade plant.”

My grandmother’s jade plant never bloomed, to my knowledge. In other words, it never bloomed this profusion of white flowers. But it did bloom year round. It bloomed tea leaves. Piles of them.