May Flowers

I spent the morning over at the vegetable garden on my friend's property. We're growing a lot of fun things and everything is going great guns! Peas, broccoli, cabbage, kale, lettuce, spinach, cucumbers, zucchini, tomatoes, beans, potatoes, fennel, chard... whew! What a crop! It was getting a bit overgrown, so a day and a half of weeding, transplanting, and taming were due. Brought home a nice little bag of spinach for a salad, and a bouquet of mismatched flowers that made me think of my Gramma.

Both my great-grandpa Albert, and my Grampa Ralph grew beautiful flowers in the postage-stamp backyard-turned-garden over the nearly 50 years they lived there on Colby. This bouquet reminds me of the ones that always adorned their table. It also reminds me of the bouquets we would take to the cemetery on occasional Sunday visits. We'd put them in the urns that were stored right in the flat headstones; you'd unscrew the round ring, pull out a bronze 'vase', go over to the nearest water spigot, fill it up and stick it right-side up again in the same hole. Pretty nifty invention. When I was small we took flowers to my mom's grandmother's grave. Her name was Sena Larsen, but she died long before I was born and I know her only by photos. When her husband, my great-grampa Albert passed, we took flowers for him too. There was always a stop at the grave of my mom's cousin Jim, who died at the age of 19 in Viet Nam, only two months into his tour there. I usually wandered over to the children's section of the cemetery to look sadly at the tiny little headstones carved with lambs or toys and inscriptions such as, "Our Little Angel" or "Taken Too Soon".

It used to be the normal thing to do, going out to the cemetery to pay respects and bring a bouquet of flowers from your own yard. It was nice, actually. I guess that's why this particular bunch of flowers harken back to that simple time when what you had was what you made do with. No one would have thought to pay good money for flowers from the florist! How impersonal! No, we knew that the gentle soul laid to rest there was going to take joy, somehow, from that simple offering. And as we buried our faces in the bouquet before placing it on the grave, we remembered our loved one, and took the fragrance with us when we left. I still think of my Gramma when I smell sweetpeas. And Grampa Albert when I smell lilacs. Perhaps part of those associations have to do with being purposeful in our graveside offerings.

On a lighter note (!) We're getting moved in to our new place and loving it so much! Here's a look at the living room in the morning light. I don't spend a lot of time there; we have a family room with a fireplace, so when we do sit down, it's been in there, but I love this house. The light in every room is so lovely!

Bob is building me an arbor over the steps to my raised garden beds out back. He uses recycled materials from the dump or yard sales and puts together the cutest things! Now that we have a big yard of our own, he's making me all kinds of treasures. A garden shed is next on his list...

So that's the latest from my neck of the woods! I had a wonderful visit over Mother's Day with Jordan, Dianna, Micaiah, and Elliyah! The Coast Guard has them in Virginia now-- still too far away, but I'm so thankful for our visits!