When I travelled to England in college, one of the first British people to greet me in the airport said, "So, you've come to see the daffodils?" I didn't know what on earth he was talking about until we visited the home of Wordsworth later in our trip. His famous poem "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" reminds me of days like today.
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Late last summer we moved out of our little cottage in the city limits to two acres of tangled, overgrown paradise--a tiny family treasure of place where my own father and his three siblings were born. I spent the last seven months updating the three-bed, one-bath house inside with paint and wallpaper, cozy fabrics, and all of my favorite things, but I was also dreaming of how to transform those rambling perennial beds outside into something other than chaotic mats of quack grass and briars.
This week as the bulbs came into full bloom I began. Each day I've dug a few more weeds from the beds, and each day a new little crop of blossoms planted by the previous owner, Stella Mae, has opened its petals to the sun. It is exciting enough to see plants you've buried rise in the spring, but the surprise of those hidden by other hands is an even greater blessing. Every day is a treasure hunt! Besides the rows of yellow daffodils and scatterings of grape hyacinths, we've been greeted by white daffodils, narcissus, pink and blue hyacinth, red tulips, creeping phlox, sweet little miniature narcissus, and today a little cluster of baby pink tulips is turning more and more rosy under my picture window. I easily have fifty peony plants poking their shoots up, and soon there will be a profusion of lilies of the valley as well. What a glorious gift from heaven after such a long, cold winter!
