I can’t remember if I shared the story

of my mama’s roses with you before…

But I want to be sure that I write it down for all prosperity. HA.

So here’s the deal – [way] back in the sixties our mama played on a little softball team –

I have no idea the name or how the league worked…

But she played most - [some] - [all] of the games at Robbins Field in Tuscumbia…

Sister and I would play in the stands during the game / practice.

Sometimes we played alone… sometimes with the Reiner kids or the Rhoden boys…

I remember concrete stands – but were they just aluminum ones?

[Ha < -- THAT would make more sense, right?]

I will have to have sister clarify t hese memories for me...

ANYWAY --- on the drive over we’d go down this REALLY long road called King Avenue

[don’t you love how our perspective changes as we grow up?]

and as we were getting close to the field, we’d pass a house

with roses full of blooms just pouring over the back fence.

So beautiful… I think we drove that way, instead of the quicker way down 6^th street,

just to enjoy the beauty of these flowers…

So… fast forward ten or so years… I’m in high school,

sister is out of the house, and brother is 3 or so…

And our parents go for their dream of building a home OUT IN THE COUNTRY.

Now, that’s a story for another time –

I will share that we moved once to a house across from a sweet aunt due to our house selling before the other was completed – then moved to the dream home –

where we lived , maybe two months --?

[We learned that we are definitely NOT country folk after all. LOL]

Then back to town we went – and the parents found THIS home at a great price

[some neighborhood things going on at the time -]

and we moved the third time within about six months.

I remember our father saying the only way he would move again was on a stretcher –

and they did live there for the next 30 years…

Now, I’m pretty sure they were sold on this house not only for the price, but also because it had a double concrete storm shelter underneath the added master bedroom…

[Y’all know how afraid our mama was of storms, don’t you?]

But a part of me wonders if the roses might have had

a little something - something to do with it.

They were just as beautiful as I’d remembered them as a kid.

And, oh the fragrance each spring when they bloomed – so wonderful!