I bought this tree peony when I had a kitten called Baby whose real name was Ginkgo and I had intended to purchase a ginkgo. The cat had a hard time. He fell and hit his head as a very young cat and had to have brain surgery for a bleed. Then he died a year later of feline leukaemia. I was broken-hearted. Especially as around this time I lost another cat, Eskimo, who simply disappeared.
The peony has fared rather better.
When I was a child, I thought Peony would be a lovely name for a sweet-natured and very pretty pony. I used to make up stories about Peony's exploits with her companion human. In those days, I also had an imaginary horse called Meladore. He was found at some dodgy place almost starved and had to be brought back to wellness by his loving companion human. The name was inspired by two horses in a book. In the first American school I went to in Saudi, the teacher used to read to us after lunch for a spell and the horses were in one of these books. They were Melanlass and Melanwee, I think. I can't recall the book. It was some sort of fantasy novel... Can't track it down.
Thinking up names for horses was what I used to do instead of counting sheep. A dapple grey Arabian mare called Dappled Silk. That's all I can remember.
Anyway, the peony. It's very beautiful and copes with the acer, lilac and bamboo trying to overshadow it. I help. And now it doesn't have to worry about the box, thanks to those moths.
Lovely.