3-25-10...THE OL' LILAC BUSH!
The wind is blowing 90 to nothin' out there and rain is pouring. Another burst old ol' man winter trying to push his way back in. Spring might be delicate right now but I've noticed it always wins this time of year. There is the bright yellow of the Golden Rod, and the vivid red of the fire bush. Right in the middle are the beautiful Daffodils with their heads standing high. Yesterday I noticed my Little Lilac bush was all budded out. They are supposed to bloom after five years. It has been there seven years and has yet to bloom. I looked closer and that little bush is just covered with the little purple shoots that will soon be a big fragrant flower. My very first lilac blooms. Oh I've had other Lilac bushes but this one is special to me and I had just about given up on it. I am so excited by this that I can't contain myself till the blooms grow and burst forth. My favorite flower in the world.
Now the whole reason I hadn't given up and dug the little puny thing up is where I got it.
Mamma grew up on the side of the hill above where she finally moved with Daddy after marriage and she told me so many stories about a big lilac bush that was in the woods near her house. She had escaped there many times to avoid two younger sisters who looked to her for more than she should have been expected to do. You know that older child thing where you are supposed to let the younger sibling tag along. Mamma said she would go to the lilac bush and crawl underneath and fantasize about so many things that she would never have. That Lilac bush was more like a tree from pictures I have seen. Must have been magnificent in full bloom.
The place had grown in to just a thicket over the years and Mamma hadn't thought much about it. One day she and her two sisters had tried to get to where the bush had been but was unable. Mamma talked about how she would love to get a sprout from it. I grew up and was away from home for 20 plus years and never thought about that bush until Mamma talked about it again after she got so sick. I came home to stay in 1999 and Mamma was very ill. I decided I had to get her a sprout of that lilac bush somehow.
I went there every time I could through one whole year trying to find a way in to where I thought it would be. Sometimes that spring I could smell the lilacs. I love the smell. I finally hacked my way to it one early fall morning. Of course it was not a big magnificent thing anymore. Really just a bunch of sprouts around a dilapidated bush. I couldn't tell my Mamma that so I dug two sprouts and brought them home with me. I planted both in Mamma's yard. One died but the other one was thriving. Mamma got worse and had to go to a Nursing Home when we were no longer to give her quality care at home. We had to sell the house for financial reasons but I dug the Lilac bush up and brought it here. That spring I went back up on that hill and picked a few scrubby lilacs to put in Mamma's room. She was so thrilled and would reach over and gently run her hand over them. I held them close for her to smell. It made her happy to have a lilac from the Ol' Bush.
Mamma died that very November. I have coddled my bush ever since and just couldn't make myself give up. Now seven years later I will finally have some blooms if this old cold weather will cease.
I have been feeling my Mamma's presence so strongly lately all around me. Well Mamma your ol' bush is gonna bloom again for you. I'll bring you a bouquet'!!!
