Gisela Daisy

It's a glorious summer day, and siblings Leo and Klara are spending their vacation together with their parents in the Tyrolean mountains. Father praises the fresh air, and their mother is delighted with the cool, clear spring water. Today they are going on a short mountain hike together again, but for the afternoon, siblings Leo and Klara finally want to visit the large flower meadow behind the castle woods. As soon as they arrive, the two are thrilled by the colorful splendor of the flowers. There's a purple bellflower here, a pink carnation there, and other flowers whose names they don't even know. And how fragrant it smells here! To Leo's great delight, beautiful butterflies, busy bees, and fat, buzzing bumblebees are also swarming in the meadow.

While Leo chases after a small blue butterfly, Klara talks to the flowers and says, „Yes, you're growing beautifully, in all sorts of colors, and look how big you are already.“ At the same time, she gently caresses the blossoms with her flat hand. Then she suddenly hears pitiful sobbing and whimpering from beneath her. „I always say it, nobody sees me. I'm so small and I don't have a beautiful, splendid color either. I'm inconspicuous – sniffle – ... nobody really notices me. Oh, it's enough to tear off my petals, my existence!“

For several days now, Daisy has been watching her Aunt Marguerite, how proudly she has grown tall, far past Daisy, and is now drawing all eyes to herself. Daisy is terribly unhappy with herself, with her size and her color. In the spring, Daisy was still one of the first flowers to hold her little head up to the sun and thus be able to survey the entire meadow. But meanwhile, she is being covered by many other meadow flowers.

Suddenly, a friendly girl's face appears before Gisela, who, startled by her sobbing and self-pity, falls silent. „Now, what are you complaining about, dear little daisy?“ Klara asks, surprised, and kneels on the ground. This is already too much for Gisela. Little – LITTLE – she called the girl, and fat daisy tears rolled down her stem.

Shaken by bitter tears, her Aunt Margerite now speaks up. She had no idea how unhappy Gisela was, and says: „But Gisela, you may be small, but you mustn't complain about your flower color. I don't know any other flower in our meadow that has such beautiful, slightly rosy-pink petal tips like you. Besides, you grow much longer than we daisies. In spring, you are one of the first flowers and then you grow well into the autumn, when we other meadow flowers have long since withered. Gisela, daisies are simply beautiful.“

Klara also tells Gisela how happy she is that after the daisy season, she can also make flower crowns with daisies. And the best thing about daisies is that Klara's mom now always puts daisies in the salad, and so Klara's brother also devours salad with joy. He likes the young blossoms the best because they taste nutty. And as soon as Klara calls Leo to her, he comes happily with a daisy behind his ear. He also tells Gisela that there are even daisies in cough syrup, so it's no longer a problem for him to swallow the cough syrup.

Then, from under Gisela's leaves, Guido the ladybug, Gisela's best friend, emerged and said, „You see, Gisela, I've always wanted to tell you that too, I just never found the right words.“ Content with himself and the world, he hugged Gisela the daisy intimately once more and sat down on her petals. With all the kind words and her popularity, especially with the children Leo and Klara, Gisela the daisy was quite pleased and truly surprised at how much good daisies can do. Now she was really proud to be a daisy.