Roses

I had a colonoscopy today after two months of on -going pain and other issues that I promise not to write about.  I thought having an invasive medical procedure  would distract me from thinking about my dad.  Today would have been his birthday.  I largely ignored social media because I wasn’t sure I could handle seeing my memories of birthday pasts popping up.  Thank goodness for anesthesia because it mostly made me sleep through the day.  But I’m awake now, and I can’t quite turn off my sadness.

I did come out of my grogginess in the late afternoon and took Blue for a short walk and sat out in the sun for a bit.  My roses are leafing out nicely.  I found out about the breast cancer last year around this time and I had an urgent need to get some things done around the yard.  One was to make a rose garden.  At the house I grew up in my dad had roses of all varieties growing against the garden fence, along the side of the house, in front of the house, and near the patio.  I spent hours standing next to him telling him dumb stories, reading to him out of my library books, as he hand watered each and every bush.  I think he had an internal timer for knowing when the buds would open to a perfect blossom because he would clip a couple and bring them to my mom in the house.  He almost always brought her pink buds, not red for love, but pink because that was her favorite color.  When they sold that house, mom went around and took pictures of all the rose bushes.  One of the first things Dad did in their new house was to plant rose bushes at the edge of the lawn.  I was living in Denver then, but I remember being home when Dad was digging the holes with his post hole digger.  His crazy cat was hiding in one of the holes next to the bird feeder.  Dad got a kick out of that and left her, her foxhole.  She wore a bell, so usually the birds got a clean get away.  And when they moved to their last home, Dad once again planted rose bushes.  One of the last things I did at that house was to photograph one of the roses in bloom.

When I was working at St. Scholastica, I met Sister Jean who also had a profound love of roses.  She tended the roses near the front entrance much like my father.  She hand watered them daily and snipped the dead petals, so more would flourish.  I will never forget Dad coming by the school and getting out of his car in the circle drive and clipping one of the roses just ready to bloom with his pocket knife.  “It’s for Madre,” he told me.  I didn’t think much of it, because that’s what he did, but the next morning, Sister Jean announced during morning assembly that someone had stolen one of her roses on the brink of bloom and she was very sad and troubled by this sin.  I came to her later and told her that my father had taken the rose to give to my mother.  Sister Jean laughed and said, “Oh, well, if it was for love, then that’s a noble reason.”

I wanted my own roses, to water and tend and honor my memories of my father and mother.  So today while I was sitting out in my rose garden taking stock of work that needs to be done in the yard and trying not to think of my father, and trying not to think about what my swollen colon means,  a hummingbird flew over my head and hovered near the climbing rose.  I’m not sure what attracted it, because there isn’t anything blooming really, and it only stayed a moment and took off.  And I instantly remembered being a tiny child camping with my family in Aspen Glade near Antonito.  Dad came rushing to the campsite, excited to show Kevin  and me something.  He took us to the truck. A hummingbird had somehow flown in one of the cracked open side windows and was going crazy trying to escape.  Dad opened the door and very carefully caught the bird in his hands.  He held it so Kevin and I could see it up close.  I will never forget how tiny it was and how fast its heart was beating.   Dad set it free.  I can’t see a hummingbird without thinking of my dad’s big hands, gently releasing that creature into the morning mountain air.  I’m not super spiritual and I don’t look for signs and stuff like that, but I went back into the house with a sense of peace.

If I’ve learned anything in the last three years, it’s that really none of us know what the future holds.  I guess it’s best to be positive.  As much as I try to hold my pain at bay, my dad is always, always close to my heart.  I just need to remember that my memories are good and give me strength.  So happy birthday, Dad.