Tulips 1946

Last week I received flowers from Pappos (my grandfather), and the crazy part is he’s been gone now for almost 33 years.

Now let’s drift back in time to 2017, Joe and I had just returned to Meeker and moved in with Mom during construction of our house. It was bound to be an adventure moving back home at age 55. Mom’s house is much like a museum and an archive of family history. Some I’d forgotten and some I didn’t know. She parts with almost nothing; closets and the attic are organized by theme, year or person, all amply boxed and labeled. During our stay I uncovered so many treasures, but I had no idea the value they’d bring.

For my temporary office at Mom’s, I set up shop upstairs in my childhood bedroom. My old closet was chock full of treasures including the likes of an orange and black paper mache caterpillar I made in 7th grade. The deeper I dug the more of a treasure hunt it became. Eventually. I came across a manilla envelope of letters from Pappos who was my first and most colorful pen pal. Our constant exchange of letters was the foundation for my quest to stay in touch still today. With each letter I opened the dial of time turned back to the days when I raced to the mailbox in hopes or finding a letter from Pappos.

He was a dynamic man whose letters were a mirror image of his life. By trade a school teacher who home-schooled my Dad and Uncle Mike and occasional neighbor kids, he ranched, ran a summer camp, raised trained and raced thoroughbreds, spoke 3 languages, calculated the square root of the number of days since his last cigarette in his head every night before bed, AND was an incessant gardener. He was forever telling me of his impending seed order from Gurney or new plants he was raising. He cultivated and marked seeds every year.

His letters read like a novel, with a hint of sarcasm, and were typed on his manual typewriter. The only handwritten parts of his correspondence were his signature and notes he added about things he’d taped to the page. Two of my favorite attachments were horse hair from his stallions tail, and a bug he’d found on his tomato with the note next to the bug, “this bastardly bug was found on my tomato plant.”

The discovery of Poppas’ letters fueled my fire to reconnect with him, and I hit the jackpot when I came across a box in the attic that was labeled “Tulips 1946.” I recognized the slightly reversed tilt of the blocky script letters as the handwriting of my Pappos. As I carefully pulled back the discolored tape and lifted the lid, I found 15 individually wrapped tulip bulbs; each meticulously wrapped like a burrito in thin white paper. Now more than 7 decades later, the paper had become brittle, and it cracked and fell apart as I unwrapped each bulb. The bulbs looked particularly dry and withered, but didn’t smell moldy so I repackaged them in brown paper and returned them to the box. I didn’t however return the box to the attic, but instead added it to my stack of garden seeds and bulbs to take to the new house.

Fall of 2017 I planted Pappos’ dried tulip bulbs and covered them with mulch for the winter at the new house. I didn’t hold out much hope for them sprouting in the spring, but they proved me wrong. They cautiously poked their heads up from the earth after their 72 year nap, only to wilt with a spring frost with no blossoms, and losing leaves shortly thereafter. In all honesty, I forgot about them as they went back to sleep for the 2018-2019 winter. Once again this spring they poked their heads through the soil and must have liked the view this time. Last week I counted 8 tulip blossoms and 4 more with buds.

My heart sang every morning this week as I took time to say good morning to Pappos, and I walked past my beautiful tulips. I dug out his letters and poured over them like I had just received them for the first time.

Little did Pappos know that 73 years ago as he carefully wrapped up his tulip bulbs and packed them away that he was sending them to me. Neither did he know how his letters, his personal communication to me, not to be shared or posted anywhere would rekindle all he meant to me. If nothing else comes from this Pappos, I promise to send tulips to someone I love and will write them personal letters as well. And if by chance a stray bug wanders across my tomato plant you can rest assured I’ll include it in my letter to my grandchildren one day.

“Love is the flower of life, and blossoms unexpectedly and without law, and must be plucked where it is found, and enjoyed for the brief hour of its duration.”

- D H Lawrence

Thanks Pappos! I love my tulips, and promise to share them, as you did with me.