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Three Thoughts for Thursday

Three Thoughts for Thursday

An upcoming trip, my new super power, and watching the local wildlife in this week's 3 thoughts.

  1. Press Release: The Man of Steel and I are going to Philadelphia with my sister and brother-in-law next week. We want to assure reporters in the City of Brotherly Love that we do not expect the same level of press coverage as the Pope received. Though we wouldn’t turn down a parade in our honor and a ride in the Pope-mobile.
  2. New Super Power: The ability to select the public bathroom stall with a latch that appears to be secure but mysteriously opens once I’m seated on the porcelain throne.
  3. Simple Pleasure of the Week: Watching a flock of birds discover and devour the teeny-tiny fruits on our ornamental crab apple tree. Though if they eat all the fruit before it ferments, we will have to forego the annual tipsy-birds-falling-out-of-the-tree extravaganza.
Petal Dancing This Fantastic Friday

Petal Dancing This Fantastic Friday

crab apple petal danceThe Man of Steel cut down the dying crab apple tree outside our bedroom window 6 years ago. But the memory of its beauty and my sweet, laughing children remain fresh in my mind, thanks to the post below. I hope it makes you smile.

Earlier this week, the crabapple tree that guards our bedroom window began to flower. Yesterday, in the soft, warm breeze, it began to sluff off it’s blossoms petal by petal in a slow and lovely dance. They looped and twirled and floated along until the west wind set them, ever so gently, between the waiting blades of green, green grass.

I watched them dance, fresh and pink, and thought of my children. One May day years ago, Allen and Anne stood beneath the tree while Hiram shook the branches and petals rained upon their hair and shoulders. Our children danced, their hands raised high to catch the soft flood. Hiram’s mother, here for Mother’s Day, laughed as she snapped picture after picture. Finally the kids, tired and sweaty, flopped onto the greenish-pink, trampled grass.

The tree is dying, has been dying for years, was dying while Hiram shook the branches. All that’s left is one large limb, and we know that this year, after many seasons of procrastination, the tree must come down. “But wait,” I asked my husband, “until it blooms again, until after the petal dance.”

Yesterday, when the breeze arose, I took my mother-in-law’s place behind the camera and took picture after picture of the petal dance. If you look closely, beyond the wind-shaken branch, you can see them falling, – tiny, hazy, pink raindrops. And I think if you are still enough, patient enough, then perhaps you will see what I do: two precious children, arms raised high in a springtime dance, so happy, so young, so loved.