Why are "annuals" called that, when they don't come back every year?

Let's just talk about this crazy word for a minute.  When we talk about annual plants, that means you have to buy them fresh and new every year.  You can't just plant them once and watch them pop up again every spring.  Who, in their right mind, decided to call them annuals? 

In my mind, the plants that come back every year, are annuals, like this definition of Annual from the dictionary:

adjective

1. of, for, or pertaining to a year; yearly: annual salary.

2. occurring or returning once a year: an annual celebration.

 

Got that?  "Returning once a year.  Yearly".  Well, that is NOT what happens with THOSE kinds of plants.  The kind of plants that need to be replanted each year should be called "quarterlies" or more like "3-monthlys" for they really only last about 3 months and you gotta replant them every season.

 

I was talking about this with my daughter the other day we wondered how did these plants ever survive in the beginning?  If they don't come back in the next spring, that means they just completely die.  They don't sow any seeds that sprout back up in the new season.  Or if they do sow seeds, why don't they just grow right there where they were dropped?  They don't leave roots behind to re-sprout.  They leave nothing.  Nada.  Zip.  Zero.  Yet somehow, magically, they are here now. 

 

So where does the fresh crop of "3-monthlys" come from?  I think they come from seeds, but who gathers them?  And if they can be gathered, why can't the plants just drop them in the dirt, scattered by the wind, or bird poop, and grow the next year?

 

I am wondering if no one harvested the seeds, if the annuals would be gone forever?

 

Perennials, on the other hand, are plants that live for MORE than 2 years.  They appear to die out, but return each growing season.  Actually, they continue to grow, albeit so slowly, all year through stem or root systems.  So they seem to be named correctly, according to me.

 

It's the "annuals" that I just can't grasp.  Like, how it all got started - who figured it out and how they managed to collect the seeds before all the flowers were gone forever.  Smart little cave people!  Or, maybe it was the aliens. . . hmmmm....still could be.  Every year, the aliens stop by earth and drop off a fresh batch of "annual" seeds to . . .umm...Burpee and. . .Andersons. ...yeah, that's it.  Aliens.

 

Let me know if you KNOW where the real, true source of the "annual" seeds come from each year, or how it all started in the beginning. 

As far as I'm concerned, the 3-monthlys come from aliens and that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

TTFN!