I’m pretty sure my dad never imagined that one day he would come back as a flower.  A circus clown, maybe, or an old shoe with paint splatters, or a naughty puppy with blue eyes.  But never a flower, and especially not a pink one, of all colors.

Four years ago today I looked into Dad’s blue eyes for the last time, trying to memorize every last detail of his face before it was lost to me forever except in pictures and video.

Two years ago today, a strange flower bloomed in my garden.  A pink lily that had never been there before and resembled nothing in my yard.  Unique and independent and colorful.  I’d already seen signs of Dad in rainbows and airplane streaks across the sky forming the shape of a cross and blue butterflies fluttering around with a sense of humor about them.  Now I let myself believe for one ridiculous moment that this was my dad, appearing in the form of a pink flower to remind me that, no matter the growing distance between his presence and my life each passing July 22, he was still there, bright and colorful as always.

He would have gotten a kick out of that.  Oh, that dreamy child of his.

Except last year on July 22, the pink flower bloomed again.  Odd coincidence, I supposed, but I enjoyed sharing the story and imagining that just maybe Dad was playing one of his jokes again.  A pink flower.  How ridiculous was this idea.

This July 22, my mind was on everything but pink flowers.  I drove into my yard hot and frazzled, thinking about the contract I needed to email to my clients the minute I got into the house and the pie I needed to whip up for the cook-out later.

As I got out of my truck, I spotted it.

The flower.  Out of nowhere.  Bright and pink and colorful and independent.  I am here!  Smile for a minute, forget about your troubles and remember, I am here.

Hmmmm.

A pink flower?  Who am I to say what’s possible?

I was driving along the highway in my monster truck, zoned out listening to the instrumental version of “Sleighride,” when a tiny red cardinal came along out of the winter morning.  The male kind, the striking red you notice especially in winter against the backdrop of the gray, leafless tree limbs. 

This little guy stood out, too, but it was too late.  He flew across the road like he couldn’t help himself, and he was no match for my monster truck.  I squeezed my eyes shut and hoped he’d made it across.  But when I looked back in my rear-view mirror, I saw the unmistakable flash of red bouncing and fluttering on the road.  Even worse, he wasn’t dead, instead in pain and lying there waiting for the next monster truck to come along.  I said it aloud, “Oh, no, I hit a cardinal!”  Like hitting a wren or a robin wasn’t as bad, but a gorgeous red cardinal, and a teenage cardinal at that.  I felt sick, and the cheerful music felt wrong.

I tried to console myself with the thought that it was the little guy’s fault.  Surely he saw me.  Why did he just fly into my truck?  Stupid bird.  Or else he was reckless, or he wanted to die.  Except maybe he couldn’t stop mid-flight.  And, when it came down to it, why do I drive a big mean man-made truck?  He was just flying along in his own air space, minding his own business.  His kind was here before my truck ever was.  He belongs here.  My truck has no business here.  Maybe I should stop driving entirely. 

I felt sick the rest of the way home, in honor of the lost cardinal, knowing in an hour I’d be having brunch with friends and would have forgotten all about him, while he flopped around on that cold highway getting rained on.  I vowed to fill all my bird feeders to the brim that morning.

When I pulled into my driveway, another cardinal just like his lost friend was perched on my fence, the exact same size, another teenager.  Maybe they even went to the same bird high school.  I told myself it was a sign, that this little bird was here to tell me, “It’s alright.  It was meant to be.  It’s all part of the circle of life.”  I turned off the ignition and paused there for a minute, door closed, not wanting to exit and scare him away.  “No, really, go about your day,” the bird told me.  “Never mind us.  It was his fault.”

Or maybe I was just trying to make myself feel better.

I set out for my morning walk with purpose, because I need to soak up some Vitamin D and burn a few calories after last night’s minty cocktails and barbecue meatballs, and besides, I hear walks are supposed to be therapeutic, too. Along the way I encounter sidewalks full of leaves — the crunchy kind you can’t resist plowing through instead of walking around, going out of your way to crunch every leaf flat.

And I can’t help but flash back to when I was eight and had to walk to the café downtown after school to meet my dad so he could give me a ride home. Six whole blocks, bor-ing, and it took for-ev-er. But the crunchy leaves along the way served to ease the boredom, and I made sure to shuffle through and stomp on each and every one. Oh, get that one, too. And that one.

How could I have imagined back then that some thirty years later I’d go for these walks on purpose, and five times as long. And that I’d do it in this far-away place called Nashville, Tennessee, where my favorite girl singer, Sissy-Spacek-playing-Loretta-Lynn, sang at the Grand Ole Opry. And that I wouldn’t be on my way to meet my dad, get a quarter for the Ms. Pacman machine and maybe another for a Hershey bar, bug him to finish his coffee so we could go home already. That instead I’d be wishing I could have a cup of coffee with him, ask him how he’s doing.

Nope, I never could have imagined this.

But one thing hasn’t changed. The impulse to crunch those crunchable leaves. And that one. And that one, too.