You know what they say about making the most mistakes with your first child? It applies well to plants, too. I grew up in southern California, zone 10. We were at the edge of possibility for heat-tolerant roses and peonies were not even a remote possibility. So when we moved into our house (zone 5/6 border), I had plenty of garden experience that ended up being absolutely useless. I killed at least five young roses that first year, planting them in a completely inappropriate location, having not had time to observe what the area was like over the year. I also planted one peony with them, which I’d bought on a whim because it was on sale. Guess which one is still alive and kicking?

Paeonia lactiflora ‘Sarah Bernhardt’ (lactiflora = kiinanpioni) was my first peony. I’ve got a good collection of thriving peonies nowadays, but back in 2012, Sarah was a complete novelty. It happened to be sitting on the shelf next to the roses and it looked like it might go well with them, so it came home with me.

Since I knew that roses and peonies had similar soil and light requirements, I then made the mistake of treating it exactly like a rose and planting it relatively deep. All the plants grew well enough their first spring and summer, only for everything to be flattened the first winter because the location I had chosen happened to be where our roof sheds the majority of its snow for half the year.

The roses did not return. The peony did, but I didn’t even notice it because it was just green foliage that was rapidly engulfed by the large bank of weeds that sprung up around it. Also, it never bloomed. The first few years, Google assured me that this was probably because of transplant shock. By year five, I was pretty sure there was another explanation and that perhaps it should be moved. However, I was dealing with a young toddler by then and not at all tempted to go wading through the jungle to find one ornery plant.

So there it stayed. For another four years. Yes, this thing sat in one place for nine years, neglected and throwing out nothing but leaves in a pile of weeds. I’d pretty much given up on it.

Then, three years ago, I saw something utterly unexpected — a big pink powder puff of a flower amongst the rampant horsetails and bergenias. Sarah had somehow managed to produce a flower. Last year, she gave us two. This year, there were four buds. Something had obviously happened. I hypothesize that the small maple (one of those weeds that never got pulled) growing next to it finally grew big enough that its roots pushed the peony upwards to a more comfortable depth. Some soil erosion possibly helped, too. Whatever the case, it has now achieved some sort of balance after nearly a decade of hanging tough.

Happy ending, more or less. Stubborn as this plant is, though, you can expect that there’s a twist. For the past three years that it has flowered, Sarah has inevitably managed to do so on the day of the first summer thunderstorm. I learned the first year that heavy rain will shatter double peonies faster than you can blink. It’s like she’s sitting there with a timer, waiting for the most inconvenient time to unfurl those flowers in some sort of cranky protest, willing the rain to get to them before I can.

Still, I’m glad that she’s still around, even if I have to run out before the storm every year.

Final count:

• Paeonia lactiflora ‘Sarah Bernhardt’ – one stubborn but beautiful plant