Forget Me Nots

Ellie put on her favorite soft flannel pajamas and curled up with her grandmother’s book about the language of flowers. Even before she could read, she had loved this book. The soft, watercolor illustrations were soothing on the worst of days. The cloth of the cover was worn thin on the edges from being handled so many times. She idly turned the pages, allowing her mind to wander to the memories that had become fuzzy around the edges over time.

According to the book, the pretty little blue flax flowers meant domesticity. She remembered her grandmother teaching her to bake cookies and never losing patience with a little girl who made more mess than cookies, even after staying up all night to finish them. “If I let you figure it out, you’ll remember it better for next time!” she told Ellie.

She turned to the page with the pink hyacinth – play. She remembered riding with her grandmother in a convertible with their hair whipping around wildly at 70 miles per hour while they screamed laughter into the wind. That day she learned that it didn’t matter what her hair looked like when the car stopped, only that it was fun while it was happening. “Who cares how you look right now? Did you have fun?” her grandmother said. “Remember the fun!”

The picture of orchids made her remember the doll tea parties she had. Her grandmother taught her the right way to set a table because, “Dolls are your babies, and they deserve you remembering how to entertain them correctly!” She remembered setting the china tea set out just so and dressing her babies in their finest. Of course, her own attire was a cross between a princess and a witch, but she thought she was beautiful. Refinement was the meaning here – that following the social rules was sometimes a sign of respect and education.

The calla lily meant beauty. It was one of their favorites. She remembered learning from her grandmother when it was the right occasion for bright red lipstick, and when it wasn’t (even though her mother didn’t always agree what those occasions were). “The right lipstick helps you remember where (and who!) you are,” her grandmother told her as she handed Ellie her first lipstick. “And it tells the world that you know.” She thought of that first tube every time she applied red lipstick to help her find her inner strength, her confidence, or her public mask on a bad day.

Every day was a grand adventure when they were together, no matter how routine the tasks. On a trip to the grocery store, they became explorers foraging for food. After watching a TV movie set in a trauma unit, a ride to the next town might be an emergency trip to the doll hospital, complete with frantic CPR on the side of the road. A pile of dirty dishes could become a private concert of show tunes and big band classics. (The secret: singing loudly and using the sprayer nozzle as a microphone.) The memories flooded back as she looked at each page of the book.

A photo dropped out of the book from where it was stashed between the pages. It was a picture of the two of them sitting in the middle of a muddy flower bed. Ellie remembered that flower bed off the side of the house. It was full of yellow tulip bulbs, daffodil bulbs, and other more expensive, exotic flowers. Even so, she was allowed to dig around it in the same as the bed planted with seed packets from the grocery store. Every spring they worked together to clear the winter weeds and dead leaves to get the flower beds ready for summer blooms. Ellie didn’t know who took the picture but was so glad they did. It captured the feeling of most of the days they shared. Her grandmother was glowing, even wearing dirty garden gloves and grass-stained yard shoes. Ellie looked at her childhood self and thought she might have had more mud on her face and clothes than there was left in the flower bed. Her grandmother had her head thrown back, laughing so loudly Ellie could almost hear it coming from the photo. Ellie was laughing too and looking at her grandmother like there would always be a tomorrow.

She couldn’t believe there wouldn’t ever be another tomorrow for the two of them. Her grandmother was a fixture that was always there, the one who would always answer the phone, and who always pushed Ellie to take chances. There was something about knowing there was someone in her corner, no matter what, that made a difference. Her grandmother’s voice was always in the back of her head when she was trying to make a decision. “It’s not always about where you end up, but how you got there that matters” was the mantra in the back of her mind, usually after an unplanned adventure.

She carefully tucked the photo back into the book, right where it came from. It didn’t seem like an accident that it was on the page with the forget-me-nots. “Protection and luck, peace and healing,” she could hear her grandmother whispering in her ear. “For as long as you remember our adventures . . .” Somehow Ellie knew her grandmother was still watching over her, sending her the luck to make an adventure out of the simplest things, and the protection to survive them. Somehow she knew that the memories of all those adventures would bring her peace and healing from the heartache of losing such an important person.

As she closed the book, she decided to plant a flower garden in the spring. She could picture herself working in the dirt while her baby daughter slept in her stroller nearby. She smiled as she closed the book and began to rub her swelling belly, already choosing the flowers in her mind, looking forward to her unexpected route to the adventure of motherhood.