Dandelions

 

Like most kids I picked my share of dandelions for my mom. And like most moms, she told me how beautiful they were and put them in water. But my mom never stopped telling the story of one bouquet of dandelions that I gave her. It was on a Mother's Day when I was probably 4 or 5. All of us siblings always gave my mom a corsage to wear for Mother's Day every year. More often than not, the corsage was pink carnations. Pink was her favorite color and she always said she like carnations because they lasted so much longer than other flowers. On that particular Mother's Day, I apparently didn't want to just give her a corsage with the others. I wanted to give her something just from me. So I went out and picked her a nice bouquet of dandelions. She told me how it meant so much to her that I wanted to give her something all on my own. I swear that I heard this story over and over every Mother's Day. It was rather embarrassing to hear when I was a teenager, but when I became a mom, I understood why it meant so much to her.

When my mom died, we picked out a casket for her that was identical to the one we had picked for my dad. I remember when we first picked the casket for my dad, the funeral director, Jeff (who I will no doubt blog about one day) showed us that this particular casket had a secret little drawer where you could put little momentos to send with your loved one. He commented that when that casket first came in, he chuckled at the thought that maybe you really could "take it with you"! It was one of many times Jeff provided a bit of  humor when we needed it most.

Most of us kids and many of the grandkids wrote letters or put something special in the drawer for each of my parents. For my mom, I put the tribute that I wrote for her, The Woman Who Never Did A Lot. But I  had a nagging feeling that I should put something else in there too. I couldn't decide what. And then it hit me. So on the drive to the church on the day of her funeral, I stopped and picked a perfect yellow dandelion for her and put it in the secret drawer.  I just know she has told everyone in Heaven about how
even with all the beautiful flowers (including pink carnations) that were at her funeral, her baby, Kim, gave her a dandelion that was just from her.

On Easter weekend, I picked some flowers from the farm and took them to put on Mother and Daddy's grave. I made sure to add a dandelion. When I got to the cemetery, I had to smile when I found a dandelion growing on her grave!