Scattered Seed

For several weeks we have been staring at the little plot of garden that Dad nicely bricked in by the front steps this spring. He had scattered wildflower seeds there and in various other spots around the house. This spot was becoming annoying to me, as all I was seeing was weeds, nothing that appeared to have a chance of flowering. With an excellent forecast for the day, we decided to tackle that little piece of land, and make it more appealing.

    
We picked up some marigolds (my favorites), pink and red salvia (Dad’s choice, but I like it), and two foxglove, which we think will attract the hummingbirds. Three huge bags of black mulch completed our shopping trip, then we headed home to begin the transformation.

Upon reading the little insert that came with the foxglove, we found that they would grow to 4 ft. tall, so their destination was changed to the backyard under the birdhouses. The salvia and marigolds were strategically placed around the few “wildflowers” that looked like they might develop, then I brought out a stack of newspapers. I had read in a gardening column recently, that you could lay layers of newspaper down around your plants before mulching, and it would hold in the moisture, but prevent weed growth. It looked silly as we did it, but once we wet it, and spread the mulch over it, the area looks pretty nice. The new plantings are now neighbors to Tina’s wedding-day lilies, my 50th birthday rosebush, and the two dahlias that I planted earlier this spring.

It’s been just a week since we arrived back home from Garrett’s graduation.  It was a perfect weekend, and we extended our stay in Rochester by a day so as to be able to fit it all in. We drove up on the Thursday night, the top down on the Miata, perfect weather, music playing- a biplane flew over us on our way up 390.  We had dinner that night with Garrett at the Red Robin – a new place he wanted to try.

Friday morning we arrived on campus 3 hours early. The 6 a.m. news had shown the venue, and projected a large crowd due to the speaker.  At 7:30 they opened the gates, and we chose our seating. Garrett was barely out of bed at that time, but we talked through the morning till he had to give up the cell phone for the ceremony. We found him when he was seated, not very far from us.  The bagpipers entered to signal the start of the ceremony.  They played, stopped, then started up again behind us, and we were startled to suddenly see Bill Clinton standing about 10 feet back.  (I paced that out later, so no one would say I exaggerated)….all eyes and cameras were on him as he mixed with the crowd and shook hands.  (Garrett pointed out that I took more photos of Bill, than of him.)  It became unbearably hot – the sun beating down – and I wore the program like a tent over my head for much of the ceremony.No one was in a hurry to leave, wanting to hear Clinton’s speech, but two hours and 15 minutes later, we were all headed out of the gates looking for a chance to cool down.  Garrett’s first thought was of Ben and Jerry’s so we got in line for smoothies, followed by a trip to Tinseltown to see Pirates of the Carribean.  We had dinner at the Olive Garden – it was to be our graduation dinner, since we would leave Saturday afternoon. We all ate well, made a toast to Garrett, and enjoyed our meal.

Saturday morning we were back on campus early for the Golisano School brunch, which was followed by the commencement ceremony indoors. Grandpa had been calling through the morning and decided that he and Evelyn would drive over at the end of the event.  We made plans for another graduation dinner, this time at a steakhouse,with Grandpa and Evelyn joining us.  Dad made mention of the occasion, and our waiter brought the waitstaff and a stuffed moosehead to the table with a slice of cake to sing to Garrett to cap off the weekend.

The weekend was very satisfying – a sense of completion and accomplishment – I felt it for myself as well as for Garrett – all of my children grown and finding their way.