“The audacious hope of rooted things”
That was my first thought when I looked up from a traffic light this week and realized that the bluebonnets had bloomed. It actually caught my breath looking at them and recognizing they were here, along with spring.*
I suspect the bluebonnets have been here for awhile, but my eyes have been cast down, along with my heart – and I missed the rebirth and bloom of the gorgeous wild flowers.
I feel ridiculous for how deeply I miss my GrandDad. When life goes according to plan, we are supposed to bury our grandparents. Sadly, all three sets of my grandparents buried their own children. If life is sweet enough to let us plan according to the circle of a full life, then I should have been ready. But, I never, ever would have been.
I miss him. He stepped in and raised me as a daughter when he didn’t have to. My parents divorced when I was eight months old, which lead to my mother and I moving in with her parents. Since my mom and her siblings called him Daddy, and my grandmother referred to him as Daddy in front of the kids, then I did too. Lots of my cousins call him GrandDad, or Papa – but he was always Daddy to me.