Snapdragons Singing Along a Rock Wall

My mother loved snapdragons. 

When we lived out in the country she grew snapdragons along a rock wall beside our house that was painted yellow. Once the snapdragons were fully grown the colors were breathtakingly vibrant-everything from marvelous magenta to orangey orange to sunshine yellow, purple haze, and snowy white. 

It was like growing rainbows.

When my mother didn't have time to weed her snapdragons, she'd ask me to go out and do the pulling of weeds between each plant. I loved pulling the weeds especially when the sun was shining and a breeze was coming over the fields, across the creek and up the hill. I'd bring some cookies along. Most always I'd have to go back inside sooner than later and get some more.

But while I enjoyed the cookies, I enjoyed sitting there surrounded by snapdragons even more. Especially when they started to sing. Oh I had to help them a little. And only snapdragons that had fallen to the ground joined in the chorus. The others would stand tall and listen. If I remember correctly, some even danced about, their long green stems swaying in the summertime.. 

To get the concert going I'd gather the snapdragons that had fallen off their stems and were lying on the ground. I'd sort them according to color, then I'd pick one up, position it just so until I could move the top and the bottom of the snapdragon with my fingers. The outdoor concert was underway. I'd keep changing the snapdragon positioned in my fingers until I'd used every last one of them lying on the ground. I gave each one of those fallen snapdragons the opportunity to sing their little hearts out. They always sang so beautifully. Joining the snapdragons would be the poplar leaves from my grandparents poplar trees and my grandmother's peonies, some stray dandelions, some branches of the little pine trees further down the rock wall. 

Imagination is a wonderful thing.

Those outdoor concerts were always so special. As the conductor of the show, I probably would have sat there all day long if it hadn't been for my mother. When I heard her call my name, I quickly pulled the weeds. That meant the curtain had come down on yet another spectacular sing along with the snapdragons growing along a rock wall beside our yellow house in the country.