I've noticed something about frum people and speeches: they always mentioning gardening, trees, and flowers.

at bais yaakov plays, at bas mitzvah parties; young girls are always compared to flowers, and we're reminded how we must water the flower and care for it, so we can see it blossom into something wonderful.

in high school; we were told that in order to maintain the beauty and serenity of the flowers, we must weed out the evil weeds that try to choke the poor defenseless flowers (in other words, you're earrings are too long, your skirts to short, your shoes are too expressive, your shirt is too bright...)

at sheva brachos; the young bride is more often than not compared to a full grown flower, who is now somehow morphing into a gardener, and will soon grow her own patch of beautiful flowers.

to be fair, there is a source for this horticulture business. the first place that i can think of off the top of my head is Shir Hashirim, where it talks about Hashem descending to His garden to pick flowers, referring (i think) to the Asara Harugei Malchus.

so today i was not surprised when the director of the adult day care center we went to (frum, of course) compared the organization to a tree.
"...our place is like a tree. the main component, the trunk is health care. and of course, for a tree to survive, it needs roots....and it has to be watered...." to be honest, once she started comparing herself to a growing thing, i sort of half tuned her out, since I'd heard it so often, and looked around to judge the reactions of my classmates.

they were, for the most part, unimpressed. i guess they haven't grown up being told they have to weed themselves or they would choke.