There’re a lot of Dandelions this year…a lot.
Those little yellow headed critters that dot our lawns all
spring and summer.
Well, not mine…at least not for long. Let’s just say, they know better than to make
a stop on my lawn.
My grandmother used to eat dandelions, which embarrassed the
rest of us. I mean she could have put
them on a plate …or at least picked them out of the grass first.
No…I’m kidding. It’s not like she was some kind of granny
goat. She would trudge around the yard, in the dress she always wore instead of
pants, and cut them down with a knife. Then she’d clean them up and make a
salad out of them. I was the only other person in the family
that actually liked them. A little bitter, if I recall, but hey, so am I, so it
suited me.
I actually saw my first dandelion pop up as early as
February, this year. They’re resilient little guys and you have to admire that.
They just don’t get their due, at least
as far as flowers go. In fact, I bet most of you just call them weeds.
Yeah…me too, until I found out the hard way; there’s a lot
more to them than that.
I was out the other day; let’s say “dealing” with said dandelions,
when one of them starts to chat me up.
I hate that.
Especially when…you know…I have plans for them.
I mean do I really need to assign a face to my dandelions?
Anyway, this dandelion tells me that being a dandelion in
this century blows.
That once they were held in very high regard; even given the
name of “Lion’s Tooth” to distinguish them from all the other pedestrian vegetation out there.
Now, everyone just sees them as weeds, which they find so insulting.
No one sees them for what they are, which, as I said, is really just a flower…a
flower like any other kind of flower.
“Well,” I said to the dandelion, “these days folks like to
keep their lawns nice and green. In fact they spend a lot of money on it. You
guys sort of muck that all up with all that yellow.”
“So what’s wrong with yellow? There’re yellow tulips,
carnations, daisies…and what about that obnoxious yellow rose of Texas, who
thinks so highly of himself just because someone wrote a song about him? No one
complains about any of them!”
Things were starting to get
a little heated now, at least
from the dandelions perspective, so I thought I’d better try to smooth things
over a bit. You don’t want to get a
dandelion all worked up. It can take hours to calm them down, once you do.
“Listen, ah…Dan…can I call you Dan?”
“Why would you call me Dan?
My name’s Greg…”
“Oh…sorry…I just assumed—”
“Of course you just assumed….EVERYBODY just assumes, when it
comes to the dopey dandelions!”
“Okay calm down….”
“Calm down? Why should I calm down? Don’t you think I know what you’re up to with
that little spray bottle you’re hiding behind your back?”
“Well, no. I—”
“I bet you don’t know about our medicinal properties? Or all the nutrients we put back into the
soil to make your precious little graminoids flourish.
“My what?”
‘You’re lawn, idiot!”
“Oh….”
“We’re good for all kinds of things…we even make a tasty salad…just
ask your grandmother.”
“You knew my grandmother?
But how…?”
“What…you think this measly little week is all I get? Hey buddy, wise up. You know all those little puffy seeds you
used to blow on when you were a kid?
“Yeah….”
“Well, just more of me, cloning myself over and over again,
year after year, decade after decade. But one little squirt from your bottle of
poison there and that’s the end of that”
“But that’s the problem”, I said, now armed with a salient
point. “You just scatter to the wind and spread your
seed everywhere…there’s no end to where you’ll pop up.”
“Hey, what do you expect…I’m French,” he replied with a wink.
“Alright,” I said. “You
make some good points. I was really just
coming out here to deal with the clover.”
“Good idea…they never were
lucky, anyway. And take care of that Chickweed and Creeping Charlie,
while you’re at it. They’re nothing but
a bunch of hooligans that give us all a bad name.”
And so I did.
When I returned a few days later, Greg had already transformed into
a little, white puff ball of seed.
Gently, I picked him up from his little patch of earth and
recalled our conversation.
Then, I proceeded to blow, gently…all over my neighbor’s lawn.
I don’t need any more obnoxious little know it all
dandelions on mine….
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I love dandelions. I planted a lot of them in the front yard, and brought some inside to decorate the livingroom. Don't you think Van Gogh would have been more successful in his lifetime if he had painted dandelions instead of sunflowers? On a black velvet background?
ReplyDeleteNah…they would have clashed with his black velvet Gauguins….
DeleteI had a pair once, but I don't plan to replace them becsuse they cost too much Monet.
ReplyDelete