The green handled shovel fit perfectly in a tall kitchen garbage bag and with a two foot handle it laid on the back floor board of the car without sliding around. Many times as I would drive the winding road down the mountain into town I’d spot wildflowers along the way and find a landmark so I could recall their location on the way home.
Within a few months, our mountaintop wildflower bed was full of thriving blooms on plants that took root from a start here and there along the highway. There were flowers in the mix that could not be identified by some of the oldest gardeners in the area.
Over two decades have passed since I’ve seen the garden we left behind where the wildflowers raised their blooms to catch the morning dews. I can still smell the sweet odors and feel the velvety petals when I close my eyes.
Oh, the things we leave behind unnoticed by those with hardened hearts. I can still feel her; my wildflower, and smell the baby powdered neck and the soft baby cheek against my own. As I close my eyes she’s a bloom reaching her beautiful face toward the morning dew as the sun reflects in her green eyes.
In reality she is a wildflower struggling to take root in a dry thirsty land and my heart aches with an emptiness that nothing else will ever fill.
— i said that
It’s so curious. One can resist tears and ‘behave’ very well in the hardest hours of grief. But then someone makes you a friendly sign behind a window, or one notices that a flower that was in bud only yesterday has suddenly blossomed, or a letter slips from a drawer and everything collapses.
— Colette said that