May Rose

At the tender age of forty, I became interested in gardening.  Last year I grew herbs in containers.  This year I'm still growing herbs in containers, but Kevin and I have planted several things in the yard--a day lily, a hydrangea, two chrysanthemums, a tomato plant, and the May rose.  My grandmother called it the May rose because it only blooms during the month of May.  The May rose bush in her yard is nearly gone now, but years ago, my parents started a new rose bush in their yard.  This spring my mother's friend Patrick, who does odd jobs for my parents, dug out a "start" of the rose bush for me.  My mother instructed us to get some of the root, which was difficult because all the branches of the bush led to a central root ball.  Patrick persevered and got a bit of the root although I'm not sure that the bush in my parents' yard will ever be quite the same.  I drove home with a few prickly rose branches attached to a fragile looking bit of root.  The branches were so long they extended all the way into the back seat.

When I got home,  it was evident that my "start" of the rose bush needed to be planted right away.  The little leaves attached to the branches were sagging wearily.  Two neighbors helped me dig my hole and break up the soil.  Another neighbor invited Sam over to play with her kids.  My little rose bush was planted, and my next door neighbor said it would survive in our rocky soil because being an old fashioned rose, it would be "hardy as the dickens."  I wondered if she was right though.  After we planted my rose bush and pruned it a bit, it looked like I had planted two little green sticks upright in the yard.

I gave the rose bush a good watering like my neighbor said, but then I left it alone for a while.  It was the end of March or early April.  The weather was cool, and it rained a lot.  It soon became evident that I had not paid enough attention to it.  Instead of sprouting, one of its little ends dried up and turned black.  My neighbor suggested that if something didn't happen soon, we might have to try again.  I was dismayed.

Kevin was trying to get some grass seed to start in our yard at the time, and he began to water it and the May Rose faithfully twice a day.  I would see him water the two little sticks every morning before he went to work, and I'd think, "This is why I married this man."

One Saturday night in April I dreamed about my grandmother.  She passed away in May twenty-three years ago, but she appeared in my dream so clearly that you would have thought I had seen her last week.  Grandmother was quiet and sweet.  She had this way of making you feel comfortable in her presence.  I would feel comfortable talking with her or being silent with her.  When I was growing up, my family went to her and Grandaddy's house almost every Saturday.  She made wonderful fried chicken.  She'd always have a "cold drink" in the refrigerator for me, and there would usually be "ice milk" for dessert.  Sometimes, I guess when I was there on a weekday, I'd watch "her show," As the World Turns, with her.

In my dream Grandmother was standing in her kitchen, which did not look like her kitchen anymore in that it was a beautiful warm pink color.  Still I knew it was her kitchen.  I don't remember anything else about the dream other than feeling her peaceful, sweet presence.  I awoke happy to have had a dream about her.  I dream about her every once in a while, but instead of enjoying those happy feelings my over active mind began its destructive work.  "What did the dream mean?"  I wondered.   "Is something bad going to happen?  Was Grandmother trying to tell me something?  Is someone about to die?"  I have a real talent for turning my happy feelings into troubled ones.

I woke up from this dream on Easter Sunday morning.  Two days later, three days after my dream, the first little green shoots appeared on my grandmother's May rose, those two little sticks I planted in the ground..  All of Kevin's watering paid off, and it is, after all, an old timey rose, "hardy as the dickens."   Maybe Grandmother was trying to tell me something.  Maybe she was saying sometimes the dream doesn't mean anything bad at all.  Sometimes it just means there will be flowers.