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Thursday, May 7, 2009

The Orange Tree

Little Boy's orange tree has become an asset. It is one of those plants that Little Boy guerilla gardened into my patch of garden real estate last year, knowing how hard I would find it to destroy a growing plant. I've looked murderously at this orange tree with its sharp thorns and ugly leaves often enough, but I must admit that it has now earned my respect.

Lime butterflies love our orange tree. Batch after batch of eggs are laid on it despite my running all over the place chasing away pretty butterflies with nets and the occasional Baygon spray can. The tree is a sorry sight, with its half chewed leaves and fat slugs basking in the sun. It was a matter of time before Little Boy decided to be THE cool dude who would bring caterpillars to school for his friends to learn the life cycle of butterflies from egg to chrysalis and then the beautiful butterfly. Child after child eeee-ed, oooo-ed and aaaaa-ed at the daily transformations, and the noisy gnawing of the caterpillars, and gosh what a day it was when the butterflies crawled out of their cocoons!

One thing lead to another, and Little Boy is now selling caterpillars for 30 cents each, to his friends. So far, his clientele consists of a series of young males desperate to own their very own caterpillar. And so, the ugly orange tree has given me the perfect excuse to teach my son the basics of financial management, starting with the definition of an "asset". At breakfast today, he defined it for his father thus "An asset is something you own that makes you money without you having to work." I didn't explain it that way, but there you have it - the perfect definition of "asset". Then turning around ,he grinned at me and said "It feels good to know I can have a steady stream of income from my orange tree".

So yes, the orange tree has earned my grudging respect and I will care for it better from this day forth.

6 comments:

Blur Ting said...

Wow, a young entrepreneur! I have some lime caterpillars on my lime plant. Maybe I should bring them over next time I come around (if they're still around that is).

Then he can learn about inheritance :-)

Fresh Fry aka 福星 said...

O_O!!

wah, Blur Ting, u sure think far ahead siah.....hehehe....

Blur Ting said...

Inherit my caterpillars!

By the way, if you look at the young caterpillars closely, they resemble bird poo. This is nature's way of protecting them from predators.

Petunia Lee said...

Waaaah... Blur Ting, that is a very generous offer indeed! You must have tons of them catties... and Christopher will make loads of money... and I will teach him about "commission". Hahahahaha!

Petunia Lee said...

Fry, heh heh heh... inheritance is a timely concept... as in DON'T SQUANDER your inheritance!! Heh heh heh!

Petunia Lee said...

Blur Ting, come to think of it... they do look like poo! This said, I've been recycling your poo back into the pot.