When I was a kid…
I played in the back yard beneath a crab apple tree in the house my parents rented. They never owned their own home. Here’s my mom and I in the picture on the right — the label says I was two, but I think I was four there. At left you see the end of the row of lilac bushes that ran along the side of the house. I spent hours there with my friend Darlene– playing house with mud pies or hiding from the boys playing cowboys, because in the 1950s that’s what we played.
The picture at left is my first day of Sunday School. I walked there by myself at age five. Things are different now. The lilac bushes are behind this porch and extended all the way to the sidewalk in the front yard.
Whenever I see a lilac bush I think of this yard and the row of lilac bushes so cool and refreshing in the summer, providing hours of entertainment for the imagination. I particularly remember an incident in which I was playing with Darlene on the front sidewalk– jumping rope, riding bikes, racing, dancing, twirling. And the wind blew so hard all morning, just ruining our twirls and jump roping. So I looked up at the trees on the boulevard — their branches waving furiously and obviously creating the wind. I remember calling to the wind. “Stop moving.!” I remember thinking how those trees were ruining our fun by creating the wind!
Luckily I, a girl, could attend school and learn that the trees do not cause the wind. Faulty thinking from not enough data.
There are a lot of people with faulty thinking these days. Not enough data, or misinformed data, don’t you think?
Anyone, I retell the story in today’s poem:
Whenever I see a lilac bush
on a windy day…Or when I was young,
thinking…When I was young
Sheri Edwards
playing
in lilac bushes
swaying,
a hide-away
shading
from summer heat
blazing;
Then on the sidewalk
skipping,
The wind my hair
whipping
and my rope
flipping
as trees their branches
waving—
I, in frustration,
raving
could not help
saying
“Branches, STOP your
moving!
Stop the wind you’re
shooing,
will you please?” I am
asking…
When I was young
mistaking
the trees the wind
causing!
This story
retelling
a memory
delighting,
a story for
laughing
about when I was young,
thinking.
National Poetry Month
Slice of Life
“not enough data” thinking
4/30/26
I wonder, if I draw a line... 