Mother's Day Tradition

 

When I lived in Illinois, I never planted any flowers until May, because of the possibility of a late freeze killing them. Gradually, our Mother’s Day family tradition evolved into going to a greenhouse to Buy Whatever Mom Wants. I never really had a plan on these excursions, that is, I didn’t shop with the intention of “filling that hole in the flower bed on the north side of the house.” Instead, I happily wandered up and down the aisles, stepping over hoses, traipsing through puddles on the pavement, randomly choosing plants and flowers that caught my eye with the mindset of “I’ll find somewhere to put them.” My cart became full of a hodge podge of perennials, annuals, herbs, and vegetables and I was often surprised at the final tally, but Scott never told me to put any back. He knew the garden was my happy place. At home, I would line everything up on the deck and ponder. I would pick up a container and carry it around the yard, mentally placing it either in this flower bed or that, perhaps in the garden or perhaps along the fence. Eventually, a decision would be made, and I would kneel on my foam pad, trowel in hand, and give that particular plant a quasi-permanent home. Sometimes the process took a week or more, and sometimes I would grow tired of my indecision and just dig a hole.

 

This is what happened the year we bought a wisteria vine (“vine” being the operative word here). Growing up, we had a beautiful wisteria bush in the front yard, just off the porch, that would gracefully bow over in a cave of sweet-smelling purple clusters each spring. After many years, it grew old (or Dad simply got tired of it), and it was cut down. But I’d always wanted one and imagined having an arbor where we could sit and read, or talk with friends, or have a glass of wine, sheltered by the twining wisteria that grew up and over the arbor. The year we decided to buy wisteria for Mother’s Day I was elated and couldn’t wait to see the arbor of my imagination finally come to fruition. Until then, we “put the wisteria in the ground for now,” until the arbor was built. Then we’d transplant it. That was the plan. But farm work and town work and life in general kept Scott busy and the arbor never got built. The wisteria didn’t mind. While it was happily thriving and spreading in its “temporary” home by the side of the porch, I would prune it back from time to time, trying to keep it from grabbing the wooden porch railing and pulling it down. One year, while mowing, I stopped to pull a vine out from where it had travelled under the porch, only to find that it had travelled completely under and out on the other side of the house. I stared at the yards and yards of pale, yellow vine that I pulled out, and that evening we agreed that planting the wisteria next to the porch had not been the wisest choice.

 

It was October when I moved away, and there were no blooming flowers or plants anywhere to be seen in the yard. I had intended to dig some iris bulbs and take them with me, but the decision to move, although long coming, was also somehow made quickly and there didn’t seem to be time. I think about my garden and flower beds often - mostly in the spring - and wonder how many of my plants are still thriving and offering their beauty to the people who now live there. I’ve driven by the old house many times when I visit, but I’ve never stopped. To walk along the fence and look at what is no longer mine is something I’m unable to do, even after all these years.

 

Today I’ll kneel next to my little flower bed and clear out the weeds and decide what might look nice in the bare spot I intentionally leave each year for annuals. Although most of it is currently a beautiful riot of iris, lilies, honeysuckle, lavender, and dianthus, which come back every year with no effort on my part, the corner triangle is what I reserve for something I must plant and tend to, to trick myself, I suppose, into believing I’m still a gardener. I consider that last sentence and mentally correct myself. There’s no trick involved: I AM a gardener, regardless of the size of my garden or what I may or may not plant. It’s in my heart, this desire to tend to living things, and that’s something akin to being a mother, isn’t it? So, I will go to the greenhouse, grab a cart, and wander slowly through the tight aisles of the parking lot, carefully considering the choices for my limited space. The sun is warm, the soil is damp and rich smelling from being watered, and there are bees that are busily working the rows of blossoms for sale. My Mother’s Day tradition continues.