May flowers bring tears in many ways

As the May flowers just begin to slightly open their buds and release the powerful fragrance in the air, my eyes begin to tear...both from the allergens produced by the beautiful creations but also from the memories of my mother's own tears.


It seems like our backyard on Sandhurtst Drive in Dayton, Ohio always seemed to be the scene of some kind of escapade the caused my sainted mom to just shake her head and try to smile as her Little Skeeter boy caused  yet another reason for the moist twinkles in her blue eyes. The backyard was where we dug up our dead dog, where we ran around all nekked around the tent after losing playing strip poker and where I cut off all of the branches of my mom's favorite red bud tree. It was also the site  of mom's peony bushes that separated our yard from our neighbor behind us.


Having recently acquired slingshots from Northtown Sporting Goods "The Jer" and I were looking for some more ammunition since we had spent most of the rocks and pebbles we could find in the street. We shot at everything including each other. The rocks always hurt so as we looked to find a less lethal projectile, ...we spotted mom's peony bushes.


I never thought much of flowers or bushes back in those days and heck, how could anything called pee-o-knee mean anything special. We even laughed at the silly name, never really giving any thought to how beautiful the flowers would be until decades and decades later.


So we descended on the peonies like locusts on fresh crops and began to stuff our pockets pulling each bud off the stem with the perfectly formed spheres. The buds that were slightly opened made for the best "bullets" because as they hit their targets they would explode with juices, tiny flowerettes and an aroma.


I guess mom came outside either because she heard the excitement or laughter and felt like perhaps we were up to something once again.


She saw the remains of all of the buds from her more than ten peony bushes scattered around the yard and the helpless naked stems each standing bare on the bush.
A few tears began to flow, she shook her head slightly back and forth, she reached out to me and said, "Tommy, one day you will remember what you did here. It will make you sad, but at least it will help you remember me".


She was right. I'm sad for destroying mom's favorite flowers and that brings me tears but I am happy that she loved me and understood me.  And that brings tears as well as I do remember my mom and her love and patience with her little Tommy boy.