My Dad used to steal lilacs for my birthday. "Steal" is a hard word here. He took them from places where they were not being appreciated...does that sound better? He would go out the night before, cutting them down from spots in town where no one would notice if a few were missing (there's a joke here if I want to go to an off color place about the fact that one such spot was the cemetery across the street). And so each year on May 14th I would wake up to lilacs, so many that now their scent is intertwined with birthday memories.
I don't usually do much on this day, something small with a few friends is happy birthday enough for me, but the lilacs will always be there. Mike has continued the tradition, and as much as I love the ones from the farmers market, there is something missing. Maybe there was something special about the idea of Dad going out in the cover of darkness (yes, I am capable of making anything more dramatic than it really is) to cut them down to bring them in. Maybe the farmers market way is just too, I don’t know, legal.
 |
| brooklyn botanic lilac pre-bloom |
 |
| farmers market lilacs |
 |
| lilacs at home |
No comments:
Post a Comment