Honeysuckle Road

We saw crazy May coming all the way back in February. Nearly all this month’s little calendar boxes filled up early this year. Including four consecutive, jam-packed weekends, some at home, some on the road. We thought we were fairly ready, but then my architecture practice got unexpectedly busy. Most nights this month I’ve been up until midnight or 2 a.m. drawing, writing, cooking, or packing.  As I drove from a meeting to pick my son up from school today, I listened to Diane Rehm paraphrase Freud on her show: ‘the two things people need most in life are love and work.’ I pulled up to the playground gate and parked, cutting off the radio. Through the fence slats I watched my boy fill a giant stock pot with sand and flip it over to make a crumbly cylinder. “Cake, one hundred dollars!” he called. The crush of life’s abundance saturated me just as grapes soak the skin when pressed for wine.

Our family trips could be three days or three months long and still require the same amount of gear. The bulkiest items we pack are our kids’ bedtime essentials. Their slumber depends on cuddles with a Boppy and a giant heart pillow from IKEA. That’s in addition to the more compact lovies and teddy bears. I happily pack it all. Nightlights, lullabies, too.  When our children step up from our driveway into their car seats, they take a leap of faith. That we will drive safely. That we will provide them with food and shelter. That we know what we’re doing. In return for their trust, I create a pocket of familiarity in an unfamiliar place.  The details matter to them, so they matter to me. I smooth out the lovey on the pillow, place the water bottle on the same side of the bed, and maintain the nightly order of bath, books, teeth brushing, story.

Last weekend we visited my in-laws for a family celebration. I had the opportunity to meet my husband’s extended family, including ten aunts and uncles who couldn’t attend our wedding a decade ago due to age and geographic distance. Many of them are now well into their seventies, but I could still recognize their features from the childhood portraits I’ve seen framed on desktops next to photographs of our children. We exchanged the phrase “I’ve heard so much about you!” and offered exuberant hugs and handshakes.

In the weeks leading up to this trip, my daughter has excitedly awaited the arrival of honeysuckle. When we pulled into my in-laws’ driveway and opened the car doors, we could smell the vine’s blooms on the breeze.  Just a few feet into the surrounding woods, we spied the characteristic heaps of yellow and white flowers wrapped around tree branches. The next day, between family gatherings, my daughter and I strolled out to sample the flowers.  Last year I taught her–as my mother taught me–how to pinch off the green end of the bloom, and to draw nectar out with the stamen.  After sampling a few blooms, my daughter sauntered over to her great aunt M.J., who was seated on a bench, leaning on her cane. “Have you ever tried honeysuckle nectar?” my girl asked.  “Why no,” M.J. replied, in a sublime Midwestern accent. “I’ll show you,” my daughter said. A few seconds later she was requesting blossom specifications from the woods. “Yellow or white?!!?” she yelled. “Yellow AND white,” M.J. corrected. My daughter skipped back with a handful of flowers and proceeded to show a growing crowd how to extract the droplet of nectar hiding inside each one.

A young family member is reason enough to amp up an older relative’s enthusiasm for an activity. But M.J. was genuinely delighted by my daughter’s honeysuckle instruction. “You know,” she said, pinching the trumpet shaped flower and shaking her head, “I’ve had a honeysuckle vine by my porch for forty (pron. “farty”) years. And I never knew you could get the nectar out.”  I imagine M.J. back at her home now, looking through the porch screen at the vine and remembering every detail of her great niece’s lesson.  A pocket of unfamiliarity brought back to re-invigorate the familiar.