Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you purchase through these links, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

Remembering My Father Through Hosta 'Wheee!'

If there is ever a plant in the shade garden that embodies pure, unadulterated joy, it has to be Hosta 'Wheee!' (part of the Proven Winners® Shadowland® collection).

Most hostas are stately, calm, and well-behaved. They sit quietly in the border and do their job. But 'Wheee!' doesn’t do quiet. It bursts out of the soil in spring with leaves so wildly ruffled, wavy, and contorted that it looks like a roller coaster track caught mid-loop. Even as a tiny shoot, those creamy-yellow margins ripple all the way down the leaf stem to the crown. It stays relatively compact—maturing at a neat 11 to 18 inches tall and spreading about 28 to 30 inches wide—but what it lacks in massive size, it makes up for in pure attitude.

In mid to late summer, it tops off the display by shooting up purple scapes carrying sweet light lavender flowers. It thrives in part shade to full shade (USDA Zones 3–9), and those thick, heavily textured leaves aren't just for show—they actually make the plant naturally slug-resistant. It’s impossible to look at its playful foliage and take yourself too seriously. It practically demands that you grin. Those roller coaster curves in the leaves are the true definition of “fun” in a plant.

Which is precisely why it makes me think of my Dad.

My dad was a dentist—a man his patients lovingly dubbed "Gentle Ben." Now, let’s be honest: almost nobody enjoys going to the dentist. The sound of the drill, the sharp metal tools, the general anxiety of sitting open-mouthed in a stark white chair—it’s not usually a place where people expect to have fun.

But people loved going to Dad. They thought he was handsome and personable, but more than anything, he was just plain funny. There weren't many patients who sat in his chair who didn't leave laughing.

Working alongside him, I got to watch his magic firsthand. The natural, easy sense of humor he used around the kitchen table at home and with his close friends was the exact same tool he used to instantly put a nervous patient at ease. He didn't save his best material for the office, either—home was just as full of laughter, banter, and warmth as his dental chair.

I always knew when he was getting ready to land a punchline. He’d pause what he was doing, back his dental stool away from the patient about six inches, and lower both of his arms to rest casually on his legs. Then came the story.

And man, could he stretch a joke out like no one’s business.

Half the time, he’d start chuckling before he even got to the best part. But when he finally delivered the punchline? The whole room would explode. The patients weren't just laughing at the joke itself—they were laughing because Dad found it so darn funny, and his joy was completely infectious. He was lighthearted, generous with his spirit, and just wonderful to be around.

What most people didn't realize, though, was that Dad actually worked hard at being funny. Humor wasn't just an accident; it was his craft.

When he passed away, we were going through his things and found a massive file folder crammed with jokes. Some were squeaky clean, and some were... well, definitely not appropriate for prime-time television! They were all scribbled down in his terrible, almost completely unreadable handwriting. It turns out everything they say about a doctor's penmanship is 100% true.

After some time had passed, my family and I sat down together one night, opened that folder, and tried our best to decipher them. Some were so heavily scratched out we couldn't read them at all. Some were roaringly funny. Others were "OMG" inappropriate. And a few were clearly relics of a very different era—jokes that might have landed decades ago, but certainly wouldn't pass the politically correct test today! We laughed that night until we cried. In a time of heavy grief, sharing those scribbled-down jokes was a wonderfully healing way to ease the pain of him being gone.

Seeing those pages brought back so many memories of working with him. Sometimes, with certain patients, Dad would look over at me with a smirk and ask me to step out of the room for a moment. A minute later, through the closed door, I'd hear the patient (always a guy) and Dad just roaring with laughter together. I knew exactly what kind of jokes they were swapping. And whenever Dad heard a brand-new joke he liked, he’d retreat to his private office as soon as the patient left, grab a piece of paper, and hurriedly scribble it down—leaving it behind like a tiny time capsule for us to discover decades later.

Even after he retired, that magnetic spark never dimmed. We’d take him to Potawatomi Casino, and when we'd go looking for him, we'd almost always find him parked at a card table, surrounded primarily by a crowd of women, and every single one of them would be laughing hysterically at whatever he was saying.

When we held his funeral, we didn't keep it somber. We shared his jokes. We laughed until we cried all over again. It was the absolute best tribute we could have given him, and it was exactly the way he would have wanted it.

Whoever discovered Hosta 'Wheee!' in that Connecticut nursery and gave it its name knew that plants, like people, can have a personality. It was named because the plant’s wild, dancing edges literally look like someone throwing their hands up in the air on a carnival ride and yelling, "Wheee!" It doesn't blend into the background. It grabs your attention, brightens up the darkest shade, and makes the garden feel lively.

I’d like to think my Dad was the human embodiment of the word Wheee! Everyone wanted to be in his orbit, and whenever you were around Gentle Ben, you were guaranteed to have a good time.

Now, every time I look down at those crazy, ruffled green-and-cream leaves twisting in the shade, I don't just see a unique perennial. I see a man resting his arms on his knees, backing his dental stool away, and getting ready to tell a joke.

Come See 'Wheee!' in Person!

Hosta 'Wheee!' is one of those plants I will always keep in stock at our garden nursery in honor of my Dad. If you're local, stop by the shop to check out its wild, ruffled leaves in person and take one home for your shade garden. If you aren’t local, reach out through Facebook Messenger and we can arrange to ship you a 'Wheee!' of your own!

If you want to learn to put people at ease, try these books. Remember we are Amazon Affiliates, and may earn a small commission on your purchase at no extra cost to you. These purchases help support our garden restoration project:

How To Be Hilarious and Quick-Witted in Everyday Conversation (How to be More Likable and Charismatic)

by Patrick King

Check price at Amazon here: https://amzn.to/45lQgak

The Comic Toolbox How to Be Funny Even If You're Not

by John Vorhaus (Author)

Check price at Amazon here: https://amzn.to/4b9vwWQ