My front porch is a healthy slice of heaven.
Oh, it’s not perfect by a long shot. The paint is chipping, the swing has been permanently tattooed by someone I have never met, and the renegade dandelions sprout up audaciously between framing hostas. But these things do not outweigh its charm. It faces northwest, the perfect angle toward which we can watch the sunset and drink long draughts of that enchanted northern breeze. Tractors circle the house on every side, kicking up pixie dust wherever they plow. The swing is wide enough for me and four children, and we often use it as our time machine – reading and flying, reading and adventuring, reading and resting. My husband bought me a beautiful hanging basket of flowers, with which I am smitten. They are petunias (I think), and they adorn this slowing-down-space with a generous grace from the corner just below the ledge that the swallows have claimed for the season.
It is loveliness incarnate to me.
As is often the case, two of the boys are swinging gently while reading together. The older one, usually known for his torment of the small ones, is almost paternal in pointing out pictures of hippos and apples and igloos and helping the two-year-old learn. That, being the miracle it is, was certainly not something I was eager to interrupt. But adrift in the cadence of the swaying seat, inhaling peace in all its glory, I happened to glance up at my petunias and notice that they needed work. There were many dead blossoms, hanging there withered; and upon further inspection, I also discovered the soil to be dry as a bone. Sensing it would not be too disruptive, I tiptoed back into the house and filled a pitcher with water.
The boys were still engrossed when I returned. I watered the flowers and began the ever-tedious process of picking off the dead ones, to the tune of pleasant boy voices and “no, look, Buzzy, this is an oc-to-pus“ in the background. Water ran out of the bottom of the plant and just as I was thinking this moment could not get any sweeter, the dog tipped her head up at the steady stream of water coming from above and started licking it.
My oldest daughter appeared by my side then, although I didn’t notice her coming, still absorbed in dog hilarity – watching that hairy beast snatch a rogue drink from such an unlikely source. And her words startled me.
What are you doing, Mom? She spoke and my eyes met hers, blue on blue.
I glanced at my hands, still tenderly, patiently tugging at the wilted blossoms.
Oh, this? Well, some of the flowers are dead and need to be pulled off, I explained, like so.
We pluck together for a moment, my rough hands and her smooth both keeping rhythm with the coo of mourning doves who find their own swing on the wire that runs from the house to the pole near the street. Sacred northerly breezes lift her hair here and there. The boys are studying that camel picture in the book for all its worth.
Y’know, I used to do this job for my mom when I was a girl your age . . .
And I surprise myself. I wonder where in the world those words came from. Maybe it was the sprinkle of magic on the wind or the melody of repetitious cooing punctuated with squeak of swing’s back and forth lilt that coaxed it out. I never told anyone how it made me feel to sit in the sun – breeze now teasing, now caressing my hair. I never admitted to the glory I sensed in the small task of caring for a thing of beauty, holding in my hand the death and the life of the earth-bound. I never fessed up to finding the thin place in the veil that hangs between heaven and dirt when absorbed in the minutia of common everyday gardening. How it made me feel at the same time both so loved and so small.
But somehow, I knew it was time for her to feel it, too.
And sometimes things are better taught without words.
Our fingers work side by side, and then she gets an idea. She braces herself with her hands on the railing and leaps – first balancing on her knees, then trusting one foot at a time – and gingerly shuffles down toward the basket, only the railing beneath her feet. She reaches out to prune the top flowers, but with her hand still tightly affixed to the pole, she can only reach a few.
Mom, I want to do the top, but I think I’m gonna fall if I don’t hold on to something . . . and she extends her hand in my direction.
Instinct grabs her by the forearm and we’re connected now by so much more than blue on blue. I steady her, yes, but holding her tight, it dawns on me slowly that there are many ways in which she steadies me, too. I wonder back to my childhood days in the sun and my mother who planted petunias. How that simple job gave me so much more than just a disciplined work ethic. Did I steady her as she (perhaps unwittingly) provided that thin place for me to feel the grasping and holding of God in all its beautiful fury?
Perhaps I did.
Perhaps she does.
And could it be? Perhaps this is what mothering is all about.
There is something almost magical in plucking off those dead petunia blossoms. It’s even more magical when your child joins you. Lovely post. Thank you.
yes, ma’am. magical indeed. something about the life and death theme those petals provide – and with a child so close by … an object lesson of sorts. thank you for reading, Nancy.
Though I have known for many years that my children have helped me discover the best—and worst—parts of me, I love how you have phrased it…”I steady her, yes….but there are so many ways in which she steadies me.” Beautiful word picture of bearing up one another!
Enjoy these busy, crazy years, Kelli. They are like dandelions—all bright and sunny and the next day off in the breeze!
thank you, Sheila. i plan to do just as you suggest and live these days to the full. i appreciate your kind words.
I love the way you live your life Kelli, alert and aware of the way He’s teaching and loving us constantly. I’m swinging on that porch next to you and nodding my head. My kids do this for me too, they steady me and make me see differently. For that and many other reasons, I’m grateful to be their mother. And grateful to be your friend.
wouldn’t it be just too delicious to someday share my swing with you, dear Shelly?
a pipe dream perhaps, but hey, we are the company of the hopeful living in a world of endless possibility, after all. so i won’t be ashamed to post this little dream – and tag a ‘maybe someday’ on the end …
Hey my dear, what beauty you always write. Such a joy to read your quiet heart and how you drink in God in the ordinary. Forgive me, but I can’t help but ask–is the picture above from your home? If so, it is gorgeous, and those flowers? They are million bells–they are in the same family as petunias. Petunias are larger, have a rich velvety texture, and the petals are flimsy. The million bells are small and have a different design in the petals. The tiny individual petals are shaped like bells. 🙂 Yay for a sweet husband who brings you flowers!!
hey Nacole, i’m grateful for your kind words.
the above image is actually not a pic of my real front porch, but i would have called those flowers petunias for sure. thanks for sharing your knowledge. maybe one of these days i’ll post a pic of my porch for you to see what i’ve really got growing there …
I took that photo in Canada last summer Nacole, just a little fyi. Those flowers are in the petunia family.
the miracle is in the dailyness, the loveliness, the simplest of moments. and you always know just how to share it, Kelli …
thank you, Linda. that is one of the nicest compliments i’ve ever received. i guess because that’s what life is made up of, no? all those little lovely, simple dailies. i want to live each one well. thanks for stopping by.
Yes. They do steady us.
Someone once said to me that most landscaping is purely sentimental, and I believe that may be true–at least in part. I used to need to put impatiens in the ground every spring because my father did. And I must always have a lilac in the yard as my mother did.
You have painted such a lovely picture here, Kelli.
i don’t know how i knew that you were a gardener, Nancy. maybe you have written about it … ? funny how little facts – impressions, really – stick with you about someone and you don’t know where they started.
thank you for sharing about the ways you have let that dirt move through your fingers as a way to connect with times past. i think that is beautiful.
you bless me, friend.
I like gardeners, but I’m a pretty pathetic gardener. The house I”m living in now came with quite a bit of mature landscaping, so that helps. I have window boxes on each side of the house and struggle to fill them with plants which will tolerate the right mix of shade and sun. Mostly, I struggle with just keeping them alive.
But I do appreciate those who have an eye and a gift for cultivating beauty in their yards 🙂
“I never told anyone how it made me feel to sit in the sun – breeze now teasing, now caressing my hair. I never admitted to the glory I sensed in the small task of caring for a thing of beauty, holding in my hand the death and the life of the earth-bound. I never fessed up to finding the thin place in the veil that hangs between heaven and dirt when absorbed in the minutia of common everyday gardening. How it made me feel at the same time both so loved and so small.”
This? I SO get this. I feel like there is so much stored up in my deepest places from my childhood…thoughts that I thought, feelings that I felt, visions that I saw…that hold me steady today. In fact, they are often what I turn to when I write.
I believe those moments are the golden cord that connects me with that which is so holy it can hardly be expressed.
I SO get this.
we mystics are a strange breed, aren’t we, Holly? i have been so afraid to come forth with these moments, to own up to them. but i think you hit on something big with this: ” … so holy it can hardly be expressed.”
there is a way in which speaking of these things directly is almost like a desecration. they must be told in story form – holy coming in at a slant – and if done well, will call to the spirit inside anyone else who has been to these places. even the nuance will call it forth in them.
i experience this in your writing, too.
you are beyond precious to me, friend. both your words and your heart.
There REALLY aren’t words to express how wonderful this is. You, there, poured out on the page in all of your loveliness.
thank you, Eyvonne. you are a word-smith of the truest kind: one who uses her gift to build up. love you.
Lovely, magical moment! May it linger in your daughter’s memory as your childhood has in yours. Thank you for this peek into your beautiful heart.
i appreciate your kindness, friend. thanks for reading.
such beauty, such wisdom here. Thank you Kelli
thank you for reading and for your whispered, kind words. blessings, friend.
I agree with Eyvonne. If it were possible to comment without words and communicate as much glory as you did in teaching without words…yeah, thats what Id do.
awww, Vickie. so nice of you to stop by.
and thanks for your generous words, hun.
One of my favorite things about you is your attentiveness and willingness to be taught by what many hurry to pass on by. Thanks for sharing with us, Kell.
i re-read these words today, Kathi, and they remind me of your comment:
“From the simplest lyric to the most complex novel and densest drama, literature is asking us to pay attention. . . . pay attention to the world and all that dwells therein and thereby learn at last to pay attention to yourself and all that dwells therein.”
thank you for taking the time to read. and for calling me Kel. (i find that to be just so endearing. 🙂 )
oh, and i forgot to mention that the above quote is Buechner. (who else?)
Who else? 🙂
Perhaps…:). Oh, I just love you. Your words speak to deep places inside of me, friend. How do you do that?
i could write the same words to you, Laura.
but i do not take them as a light thing coming from you. {thank you.}
Kelli – this is pure magic. Just deep-breath, refreshing magic. Thank you so much.
wow. that’s quite a compliment. i appreciate you, Diana.