My Mother and the Garden

 I've walked to the ebullient peony garden at Ashland Estate to get photos and inhale the peony air on the day before Mothers Day. The forecast for Mothers Day is grim--a gully washer. So here I am on a beautiful Saturday. My image here is bereft of people, but on this Saturday, there are harmonious 'crowds'. People speaking different languages and also the language of family. It strikes me right at the heart. A jet goes overhead and I think of the Kew Gardens where a 747 seemed to pass overhead every minute. Okay, this is a scaled down version of a garden, but it is within walking distance and it is something I can claim.

    I have this realization as I'm looking at the peonies and listening to the intimate conversations--my mother was never really a fan of gardens, at least in her Earthly life. Gardens for her meant weeding in the hot sun. She was a person of ideas and making things. Perhaps in projects where you were simply the co-pilot of God, well... Anyway, she was not a fan. Somehow, this strikes me as more pertinent as I'm looking at the fuchsia petals. MA didn't really care for gardening, yet, now she meets me in the garden. In fact, the garden at Ashland Estate. Very curious.

     My favorite story to read is The Secret Garden. I first read it as a child, reading the very book my mother read as a child. Funny that the book we shared from childhood would be about a garden. But, funny things have happened since my mother departed. She made it clear to me that she would be 'in the garden' just like Lilias clarioned to Archie. 

     So, when I am walking to Ashland Estate I love to go by the walled garden and I envision my mother's presence. Is she there? Can I be certain? No, but there is this amazing group of volunteer gardeners who tend the peony patch and the walled garden, so MA would be off the hook work-wise.

     Families and mothers are unique. We believe that we don't really have choices in the matter of where we land. Yet, here we are, looking out at all the things growing and giving thanks.