A Fitting Flower

Today I am grateful for safe travels by air and roadways as my family gathered in Iowa for several days. I appreciate the pace of our days together, the numerous conversations, sometimes one-on-one and sometimes several of us gathered round. I say thank you for this time, after the limits and restrictions of the previous year, to be together in the same space, in the familiar territory of our upbringing.

That familiar territory has changed in many ways, and also stayed the same. Just like all of us. On one of our walks, near the farm my parents lived on beginning in 1981, and where my brother currently lives, I captured this picture:

This dandelion is ready to send parachutes-official name pappi-out into the world, far and wide. Who doesn’t recall a childhood summer day, picking a few of these, and giving them some help with a puff of our own breath? Some consider dandelions pesky, but to me they are always a perky and bright early flower after the cold and brown-grays of the winter. 

There are typically over a hundred pappi that travel, sometimes for quite a distance, before taking seed in new dirt. It is a fitting flower to describe my family. As we grew up and left home, some of us landed nearby, while others made it thousands of miles away to put roots down. 

We all made it back to northeast Iowa for a few days together, the twelve siblings and our families. The last time the twelve of us had gathered all in the same place was in Colorado in June 2019 for our sister Mary Jo’s memorial service. We grieve her. We miss our father. We watch our mother slip away. 

It can all seem so fleeting, like this dandelion. All the more reason to treasure and cherish our time together and the day ahead.  Life is precious. Life is fragile. Life is amazing grace.