Sunflowers & Meadowlarks

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Monday, June 10, 2019

These photos of my current “sunflower project” show the plant from its earliest days a couple of weeks ago, to now after lots of rain. When my phone app identified the little weed, I decided to let it grow, for sunflowers are one of my favorites. Some things stay with us always, and for me, so do sunflowers from my early life in the mid-west, near Kansas, where they’re common. By the way, so are Meadowlarks. Oh!, how I miss hearing the lyrical songs that bubbled from those sunny warblers in the fields.

So memories are firing my sunflower project. When this plant’s identification appeared, I felt protective, knew it had to grow. Popping into my mind was a little essay that I wrote many years ago. It described my having followed a person who was carrying a giant sunflower, so big it leaned backwards and over her shoulder. I couldn’t take my eyes from those vivid pedals, kept asking where the flower came from, how could I get one for myself. The person said she’d grown it and had a yard full of giant sunflowers. Following on that sunny day, I stared hypnotized at the bright sunflower face. That plant winked, blinked, and nodded, seemed a sheer delight, made me want to hurry and fill my yard with tall sunflowers.

Some twenty or thirty, who knows how many years later, I’d forgotten that event. That is, until my long-time friend who was in the process of packing to move away, discovered my essay tucked among her papers. Last summer, during our farewell lunch and close to my birthday, she handed it over as a surprise. Reading, I was dumbfounded, recalling that marvelous plant’s smiling face winking over a shoulder, and my own excitement.

Through life, many things strike us as meaningful and encouraging, and yet, many manage to slip away. Despite that moment which inspired an essay, I never turned a shovel-full of soil for a single sunflower, much less for a yard full of them. What happened by writing that little essay was that I planted a sunflower in my heart.

Dreams spring eternal, and this summer one of mine may be realized in the blooming of a serendipitous sunflower. Thoughts of seeing it are pleasant reminders of a distant afternoon with a sighting, conversation, and sense of joy. These still define who I am.

Dear Friends, keep an eye on this page, where I’ll share my special sunflower. Diana