When the forsythia bushes burst into yellow flames in the parsonage yard, it meant that other signs of spring would soon follow. Those bright, yellow blooms meant rhubarb leaves would start uncurling out of the dirt and rose bushes would start sprouting upward and onward.

Warmer weather also meant I could dust off my bicycle and start riding through the neighborhood again. My sister and I could walk to the library or the movies without getting frost bite. We could run across the field to play tag at the playground.

Spring was freedom!

Spring meant that we could go outside more often for recess. Our schoolyard was surrounded by tall cottonwood trees. When the cottonwoods let go of their fluffy, white seeds in the spring, it seemed like it was snowing again. The fuzzy seeds drifted through the air like snowflakes and collected on the ground like snowdrifts. But yet, the weather was warm. We would walk through those falling cottonwood seeds with our arms out, faces upward, amazed that what was falling from the sky was not a form of precipitation.

Spring was lovely.

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I have heard many times how Dad and his brothers would wake up on wintry mornings with snow drifting through the window cracks, landing on their beds. I think Dad has even sneaked this story into a sermon or two. However, it was only about a year ago that I realized Dad grew up without indoor plumbing. He was in his teens before their house had a real bathroom with real plumbing. My father grew up in an old house in a small town in the 40’s and 50’s, and this was how life was.

The house that I grew up in was quite different. It was about twenty years later when Dad moved his family into a brand, new parsonage. It was a beautiful, four bedroom ranch house with a full basement. Perfect for the four kids!

As a child, this house was home, from the cork-covered desk my sister and I shared in the basement to the kitchen with green carpet — Mom loved the kitchen, hated the carpet — to the plum trees and sandbox in the backyard.

Home was home, and I loved it.

When I was twelve, we moved to a different town into an older house.

Oh, this house was awful! My bedroom had faded pink paint on the walls. Our basement was tiny and dark, and our backyard wasn’t really a backyard. It was just a grassy area between the church and the parsonage…not much of a backyard at all. No plum trees grew there.

In time, with love and care and new wallpaper, our new house became our home.

As I became a teen in this home, I began to realize that “home” was not a house. My mom had started working part time. I was so happy on the days when I came home from school and she was there. I chatted her ears off while she made dinner. She would nod and agree with me and move about the kitchen as I talked and talked and talked.

At 5:55 p.m. every night, someone would call Dad at the office to tell him to come home for dinner. His commute from the church next door was two minutes. At 6:00 p.m., all six of us would sit down to eat dinner together.

Meetings, hospital calls, sermon writing — all was put aside for dinner.

Musical rehearsals, piano practicing, homework completion — all was put aside for dinner.

Now, before you get all sentimental about dinnertime, let me clue you in on some things that happened during dinner. There were tears and sulking when one didn’t get one’s way. There was a hand slapped down on the table in anger; a hand which consequently had a broken bone.

But around that dinner table was also laughter and joy and being together.

Home was home, and I loved it.

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Prompt for next week:

Here in the Midwest, we are eagerly anticipating Spring. What memories do you have about Spring? What does Spring mean to you?