Daffodils, Children

Someone sent me a long story in my email today which is worthy of sharing with you. I have condensed it a bit. A mother was asked by her daughter to come with her to view a daffodil garden. When they arrived...

...The flowers were planted in majestic, swirling patterns, great ribbons and swaths of deep orange, creamy white, lemon yellow, salmon pink, and saffron and butter yellow. Each different colored variety was planted in large groups so that it swirled and flowed like its own river with its own unique hue. There were five acres of flowers... A poster was at the entrance to the garden... "Answers to the Questions I Know You Are asking," was the headline. The first answer was a simple one. "50,000 bulbs," it read. The second answer was, "One at a time, by one woman. Two hands, two feet, and one brain." The third answer was, "Began in 1958." For me, that moment was a life-changing experience. I thought of this woman whom I had never met, who, more than forty years before, had begun, one bulb at a time, to bring her vision of beauty and joy to an obscure mountaintop. Planting one bulb at a time, year after year, this unknown woman had forever changed the world in which she lived. One day at a time, she had created something of extraordinary magnificence, beauty, and inspiration. The principle her daffodil garden taught is one of the greatest principles of of celebration. That is, learning to move toward our goals and desires one step at a time–often just one baby-step at time– and learning to love the doing, learning to use the accumulation of time. When we multiply tiny pieces of time with small increments of daily effort, we too will find we can accomplish magnificent things. We can change the world.

This story reminds me of raising children...we plant one little seed at a time over a course of the years they live in our home. As time goes on and they grow older, the blossoms start appearing. We see many of them over the course of our lives with them, as they move out into the world, others see them and of course, Someone sees every single one. What a joy to have had a part in the planting.