“What’s that flower that they have a lot of in Holland?” an American teenager once asked our daughters. “Dandelions,” was the answer (our daughters were very young). “Or maybe you mean tulips.” The tulips in our front yard are nearly finished. But the dandelions are still going strong.

Tulips require a bit of work. We’ll dig them up once the leaves die down and plant them again, preferably in sandy soil, before the frosts come in the fall. 

Dandelions just show up. They pop up, persistently smiling, from the cracks in crumbling concrete and the banks of otherwise dismal roadsides. They brighten up a dull yard and a dull day. I thank God for these drops of sunshine so freely given. Though, yes,  I do sometimes pull dandelions out of the tulip beds. Tulips are more work . . . .