“Do you ever feel the wind changing before it arrives?” asked the small fern beside the riverbank.

The older plant swayed gently. “Sometimes. But not always.”

“I kept growing toward the morning light,” the fern said. “Then the trees above me changed. Now the light comes from somewhere else. Yesterday the rain was too much. Today there is none at all. I thought if I rooted myself carefully enough, everything would stay steady.”

The older plant let a few drops fall from its leaves.

“We all think that at first,” it said. “So we lean, adjust, reach again. A branch breaks, we grow around it. Too much rain, we hold what we can. Too little, we wait deeper in the soil. That is not failure. That is life unfolding.”

The fern was quiet for a moment, listening to the water move past the rocks.

“So we never really finish planning?”

The older plant laughed softly in the breeze.

“We plan with our roots. We adapt with our leaves. Then the seasons arrive with their own ideas. Little by little, through all those unfolding events, we become what we were meant to be.”