IT's just a little green shoot in a plastic plantpot. But seeing it poke up through the soil had me punching the air with as much joy as a Sunderland fan celebrating the great escape.
My sunflower, grown in memory of Private John Thomas Matthews, has revealed itself less than two weeks after the seeds were planted.
The reason I'm so excited is that the sunflower is part of a First World War community project rolled out by Stockton Borough Council with the help of local teacher and musician Mike McGrother, frontman with The Wildcats of Kilkenny.
Stockton's Book of Remembrance shows that 1,245 soldiers from the borough died in the First World War and they are being remembered with sunflowers, grown by people from the local community. Schoolchildren are among the growers and they are researching the lives of their soldiers. Who were they? What did they do before they went to war? What might they have gone on to achieve?
The sunflowers will be brought together in August to form a "memory garden" at Stockton Parish Church.
My sunflower soldier was Private Matthews. I've so far discovred that he served in the 5th battalion of the Durham Light Infantry and, died, aged 31, on May 5, 1919.
In last week's column, I told how I'd gone to Durham Road cemetery in Stockton, in search of his grave - plot number B3/32Q. To my disappointment, when I was taken to the plot, there was no headstone.
A call was made to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission and an inspector was sent to investigate. Their records showed that a new headstone had been erected for Private Matthews in 2010.
It turns out that I had simply lost the plot. With the help of the war graves commission and the excellent staff at Stockton's Registration and Bereavement Services department, I have now been guided to Private Matthews' headstone.
They have also helped me to discover that Private Matthews married Florence M. Lewis in 1910 and they had three children: William, born in 1912; Catherine, born in 1913; and Alfred, born in 1915.
It is highly unlikely, of course, that any of them are still alive but it would be wonderful to track down any of Private Matthews' family members.
It is my sincere hope that the plot continues to develop and keeps alive the memory of a brave soldier who gave his life in the Great War.
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