New Flower

I was seven years old on that rare spring afternoon. The main school building at Loretto Academy sat flat and high on a hill in the suburbs – really, it was the last major structure out on that distant end of W. Road, perched on the border of the actual countryside, that vast, golden-green distance of field and vale and farm. This, the local news media had taught me, was “tornado country,” land of monstrous clouds and great winds. I had developed a bit of fear of wide open spaces because it seemed that in such spaces, tornadoes, the deadly sky-snakes, thrived. Accordingly, our fenced-in back yard with its tidy lawn, protective trees, and access to an underground basement was my preferred pastoral venue.

     
But this day, I received a genuine introduction to countryside when Sr. Anne decided to hold the end-of-day story-reading time outside on a strikingly lovely day. She herded the small second-grade class outdoors, taking us beyond the boundaries of the parking lot, to a small shady hill bordered with trees and a low wooden fence. She invited us to sit down on the ground, a carpet of freshly sprouted grasses and clovers. She did not have to ask us to be quiet. Perhaps none of us children had ventured this far beyond the parking lot previously, but what lay before us was a sweeping view of open farm country, all so richly, wildly green on a warm day after snowmelt. No buildings were in view. Just rolling hills, smooth as velvet; small blue creeks tucked into the low spots between the hills, and perhaps two dozen cows, standing still as statues in the sweet warm breeze. All was lush, light, and new. The sky held just a few white cotton-puff clouds; when they passed in front of the sun, slow shadows moved over the hills, and it seemed that the cosmos itself was caressing the earth. All we could hear, before Sister opened her book to read aloud, was the whispering breeze and the soft clang of distant cow bells.

     
Sister was reading us The Velveteen Rabbit that day, but I don’t recall a word of it. I was transfixed by the warmth of the air and the unashamed beauty of the day. My heart was a new flower opening under a beckoning sun. I sat with my hands on the ground, palms flat on the dark rich soil, sinking my own invisible roots into this blessed world.