Why Armor Fell Out of Fashion: Forget-Me-Not Flowers

I read once that the reason Forget-Me-Nots flowers are called Forget-Me-Nots is because once long ago a knight was walking along the river with his fair maid and he leaned over to pick some small blue flowers that were growing on the banks of the river. Because the banks were slippery and his armor was heavy, he fell into the river, sank like a rock and died.

BUT not before tossing the flowers to his dismayed love on the riverbank and shouting “Forget me not!” I personally would have shouted “Can you swim?” or “Help me! Help me!” but I suppose that these would have made pretty silly flower names so maybe it is best that I was not there.

Once the shock of the whole thing had passed, the fair maid saw the silliness in dating a guy who wears a full metal condom and married a tax collector instead. Supposedly she lived a pretty depressing life though, mostly due to the fact that she had post traumatic stress syndrome and had horrible flashbacks of a man dying every time she saw small pretty blue flowers.

And this is where the flower Myosotis got the common name “Forget-me-not”. Alright, I made the last part up but the first part was so sickeningly, stupidly romantic, I had to do something to make it a more interesting story.

My neighbor and I are at odds on the whole subject of Forget-me-nots. I love them and enjoy seeing them pop up all over my yard. She rues the day she innocently brought home a clump from the bank of a creek. I let them grow. She weeds them with a vengeance.

Forget-me-nots are a love ’em or hate ’em flower. They are a free seeding biennials that can take over a yard if you let them. They are especially invasive in shady, moist soil and are commonly found by rivers, creeks and streams. But the common blue color is one of those rare and elusive colors that gardeners covet and so this is why so many of us still love them.

The most common Forget-me-not flower color is blue but I have seen pink and white Forget-me-nots. (As a matter of fact I have been trying to snitch some seeds of some pink Forget-me-not flowers from a nearby house for a couple of years now, but they just won’t grow for me. May have something to do with karma).

The good news is that you don’t have to go inadvertently kill a steel clad knight to be able to tend these pretties in your yard. The bad news is that they may just grow so much that you couldn’t forget them, even if you wanted to.