Tiny Hands. Precious Gift. [David’s blog on KS Friday]

We’ve been writing our blogs together for so long (323 weeks and counting) that this post has become something of a spring ritual: the first dandelion.

Among other things, the first dandelion plucks Kerri’s parental heartstrings. Nothing throws her back in time like the first dandelion of the season. She is regularly contacted by wistful parents after they first encounter her song, Fistful of Dandelions. The power of the arts.

What those wistful parents don’t know is that her song, as well as the first dandelion, fills her cup with yearning for the days when her children freely played in the fields, rolled in the grasses, and ran to her with tiny hands clutching too many yellow dandelions.

Artists do not invent – they articulate what lives in the fields beyond language. They touch what we experience but cannot quite grasp. In her song, she reaches for what parents feel but can barely endure – what she feels but can barely endure: little legs racing across a field, tiny hands holding precious a gift: the new season’s miracle-pop of brilliant yellow. “Dandelions for Momma.”

Fistful of Dandelions © 1999 Kerri Sherwood

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read Kerri’s blogpost about DANDELIONS

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Simply Celebrate [on saturday morning smack-dab.]

I wasn’t there when our babies picked dandelions for her. It was waaaay before my time. I just know how she felt when they did. Price-less.

It’s one of my favorite parts of our relationship. A dandelion is more valuable than a diamond. A homemade card, a painted rock…a story is most precious of all.

We read together. We walk together. We cook together. We struggle and triumph together. What could be more meaningful than a bouquet of freshly picked dandelions and the memories they bring to mind?

read Kerri’s blogpost about DANDELIONS

get this beautiful song here.

smack-dab. © 2023 kerrianddavid.com

fistful of dandelions © 1999 kerri sherwood

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First, Enjoy [on Merely A Thought Monday]

first dandelion copy

This is the season of firsts. The first glimpse of new shoots of green poking their heads out of crusty soil. The first robin. The first morning we are awakened by the woodpecker bending its beak on our neighbors old metal aerial antenna. Walking the muddy trails in Bristol Wood, Kerri gasped, jumped, pulling her camera from her pocket. I thought it might be a fox or possum. “What is it?” I whispered.

“It’s the first dandelion!” she exclaimed.

Our neighbors to the east wage a seasonal war on dandelions. Most of the folks in our neighborhood shudder at the sight of the yellow invader. One of our favorite summer rituals is walking around the corner to see if the retired man is standing sentry in his yard, armed with the latest in dandelion weeding tools. Old coffee cans strategically placed on his walkway hold the remains of the brazen few that dared show their yellow faces.

In our house, dandelions are not invaders. They’ve inspired songs. They are little yellow memory bringers. Flowers and food. Ray Bradbury. They are heralds of bare feet, hammock chats, cold wine and water balloon fights.

Each year, we enact a dandelion ritual. I am a fairly new suburbanite so I’m often uncertain of what to do and lapse into momentary paranoia. Standing in the abundance of dandelions that pop up in our yard, I fear that I should be more like my neighbors and declare a war. “Do you think we need to pull these?” I ask Kerri.

“Why?” she responds without looking at me.

“Everyone else is,” I say meekly.

“Now, there’s a good reason to do something!” she mocks me. “You? Conforming. Now, that would be a first!”

 

read Kerri’s blog post about FIRST DANDELION

 

 

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