It was the last gift my Granna ever gave me, this wooden box
with an opening of specific diameter, galvanized roof on top and mounting holes
on back. For thirteen years it had rested, hibernating on various shelves
through six moves in two states, never fulfilling its purpose. October brought
the positive mammogram and the biopsy and the surgery and suddenly everything
needed to fulfill its purpose. So the bluebird house was dusted off (quite
literally) and mounted east-facing above the blue bench and the blue hydrangea,
to the oak in the corner of the memory garden.
It’s April now, and the week has been sprinkled with gypsy
showers. It rains even now, slow and light, dripping from fiddleheads and
dogwood. The petals flutter down to decorate the lawn. Robins run. Doves coo. Towhees
“drink-your-teeeeeeeea”. The brown-headed cowbird sees me at the window and
flies from the nest it was investigating.
And in the memory garden, crinum lilies stretch. Debbie’s irises bloom.
Inside, bedsheets churn in the washer. There will be no
sunshine to hang them out in today, I think as I look out the window. A
bluebird appears on the clothesline.
Oh! Oh! Such sweet, beautiful color, reminiscent of deep
summer skies and plump berries and hydrangeas in gardens of both grandmothers.
No wonder I surround myself with this hue, from the shutters on my little
cottage to the paint on my car to the curtains and plates in my kitchen. Blue=happy. Even linguistically, I
smile at its witty polyseny.
And over in the memory garden, success. The nesting box has a tenant. Or two. This
makes me doubly happy.
My heart sings. Zip-a-dee-do-dah, y’all.
