The Kind of Girl Who Brings Herself Daisies

Daisies droop, dying over the edge of the hurricane glass, the one with the hotel logo on it from our family vacation last October.

Some of them with broken stems, some jut out in odd directions, some curl around themselves to get a better view of the light.

I am trying to become the kind of girl who brings herself daisies.

On Mother's Day, I set into the side yard with red-handled scissors. The blades are sticky with popsicle residue and I guess these are all the signs of summer before me. White pedals crawled with aphids and spiders, yellow pollen torturous, but allergies or not, sometimes a girl's just gotta have flowers.

I gathered two bundles, one for the hurricane glass and one for the porch deck, in a red polka-dotted water bottle. Those were dead by Tuesday, even with the air and the wind and the sunshine pouring upon them. The ones inside survive, barely, but they're here, rag-tag and awkward and a lot like me.

Writing is what writing does…and writing, today, is bringing myself literary daisies, quietly rejoicing in all the signs of summer.