Winter's Flowers

These little flowers bloom in the dim, cold months of the year.

We call them "Margaret flowers," after the woman who gave me a few of their bulbs years ago. Year after year, I'd see her pulling them out of her garden in the spring, making room for petunias to be planted. Back then I wondered how she could bear to tear them out, they were so pretty.

I planted my bulbs in a planter out back of my house, and was sorely disappointed that nothing happened ... until the following winter, when familiar green leaves and pink flowers emerged in a sweet little clump. How many years ago was it that she gave them to me? Six? Seven? They took over the planter I put them in, driving out all the other plants. Last summer I had to empty the planter and move it so that the new retaining wall could be built, and I dumped the soil onto the back bank.

When winter came on, the Margaret flowers popped up everywhere. I predict in two years, my back bank will have a solid winter ground cover with pink blossoms. Is that good or bad? I don't know yet.

I do know that I miss Margaret. I stopped seeing her after her husband was a totally rude and obnoxious ass to me. She's retired, and her husband, when he's not out drinking, hangs around the house drunk and thinks of things for her to do. There was no way to continue the friendship, if friendship there ever really was. Maybe she just put up with me.

I keep hoping to see her at the supermarket some day, so that I can tell her I miss her, and that I still have the flowers she gave me in my garden.