The day was blazing hot, with so much work waiting to be done. I wasn’t spending much time in thought however, as I finished off another row. Something was different about the day, something I knew but couldn’t remember. I paused to rest, focusing my gaze on the sky as I tilted my head. Well storm clouds were rolling in. I couldn’t deny the refreshing drops of rain splashing against my back. Dropping my tools I raced for the cover of the porch.

He was setting there, pondering the sky as usual. But something was wrong. I wiped my soiled hands across my jeans, as I pulled up a chair. He seemed older today, more tired maybe. Yet the kind of tired that seemed to pour from within. So I sat, letting the wind blow the rain under our refuge, across my face, through my hair, as I waited. His tears seemed to flow in unison with nature’s torrent. But I knew I could not comfort him, because he was a man who didn’t cry. Time lingered on, for the words I knew would eventually come. They belonged to us in a way. Forging our one and only lasting bond. Of course there was a great deal we did share in common. But this was one thing that I could do for him, that really meant something. “Take me up on the hill.” I stood silently, still pretending not to see, as he wiped the tears away from his eyes. I went for the keys as he filled his tiny picnic bag, the way he always did. It was red, his favorite color. He hobbled out to the car, through the pouring rain.

Halfway there the heavens opened up, and I was forced to pull over. It’s a blessing he whispered. She was speaking to him, in words I could not fully understand. Rain would always be special to our family, but they were the two who knew so perfectly why. Something inside me longed to hear, to tune my soul a little closer. But it was not for me. No, today I was the silent observer of a scene unfolding; a scene that for some reason I was unable to penetrate, yet it would always be seared against my heart. Maybe because of that I understood a little bit better, in my own way.

I wondered to myself, if they ever really needed words. For it was and probably always will be a wonder to me that such a love could exist at all. But I had seen it, and witnessed it again that day, as he knelt in the mud, the rain soaking us. I stood off to the side, studying the hills, those hills that surrounded and enfolded this place, as unmovable sentinels, protectors. He ran a trembling hand across her name, as gently as if he’d touched her face. Her beautiful face, with that smile that calmed even the harshest storms, and those eyes that seemed to reach into the most troubled corners of a your soul, knowing, understanding, and that smile always made your world right again.

She wasn’t a goddess. She was real, very, very real…

“No go straight,” he pointed. “This road.” And we drove on. It had changed a lot, although the years had traveled slowly. With a faint smile I recalled the barefoot me, who use to walk this way, so many summers ago. I let myself become lost in thought, as I knew he too was. On separate roads we traveled back in time, through fond memory.

We crossed the bend, where the tiger lilies once grew. But the road now cut away into reminisces, and only one still remained. It was here that I was a child. And here I use to come to gather the colors of summer, for her. How tall that last tiger lily seemed to me, as it stood there alone, a silent protest, against the sometimes cruel and unrelenting hand of change.

As the day began to fade across those distant hills, the color drained as shadows crept. I slowed our pace once more. He began to talk. “There’s where we use to pick the berries.” I remembered that cove. It was so peaceful and refreshing on a hot mid august day, always so still, and quiet. I use to love the way the twilight would play tricks through the growing darkness, as the fireflies would appear as if by magic to light it all again.

But now houses stood in place of trees, pavement cut the once soft ground. For change had taken yet again. Giving to some, but we weren’t among them. For all we had now, were pockets full of memories. We were the outsiders now, looking in to what had been, to what would remain, only inside our hearts, where the hand of change could never reach.

He didn’t want to go home, as I took that last turn. For home was where we had been, not where we were going. I noticed the tears well again, but didn’t see. He held his little red picnic bag abit tighter, turning his face to the window. I lifted my foot off the gas, coasting was about as slow as I could go. I watched from the corner of my eye, as he tried to form words that would not come. Finally he cleared his throat and said, “the creek is abit higher after the rain. Abit stronger maybe…” I pulled into the drive, and whispered back. “Happy Anniversary Pa…”

For a moment I closed my eyes envisioning that last tiger lily and I knew no matter what the tiger lilies would still grow…