My garden is marked by stakes of my experiments, flags denoting what flowers I have mixed with others. And Shirley says my dining room looks like the hosiery aisle at Woolworths. Because of the war, no one throws anything away, so I use my old nylons to capture my flower’s seeds. I tie them around my daylily stalks and after they bloom, I break off the stem and capture and count the seeds, which I plant in my little greenhouse. I track how many grow. If I’m pleased with a result, I continue. If I’m not, I give them away to my neighbors.

I fill my Big Chief tablets like a banker fills his ledger:

1943—Yellow Crosses

Little Bo Beep = June Bug x Beautiful Morning

(12 seeds/5 planted)

Purple Plum = Magnifique x Moon over Zanadu

(8 seeds/4 planted)

I shut my eyes and can see my daylilies and roses in bloom. Shirley once asked me how I had the patience to wait three years to discover how many of my lilies actually bloomed. I looked at her and said, “Hope.”

And it’s true: we have no idea how things are going to turn out. All we can do is hope that something beautiful will spring to life at any time.

I open my eyes and look at Shirley. She is right about the war. She is right about my life. But that life seems like a world away, just like my husband.

“Mommy! Mommy!”

Mary races up holding a handful of dandelions with white tops.

“What do you have?” I ask.

“Just a bunch of weeds.”

I stop, lean against my hoe and look at my daughter. In the summer sunlight, her eyes are the same violet color as Elizabeth Taylor’s in National Velvet.

“Those aren’t weeds,” I say.

“Yes, they are!” Mary says. She puts her hands on her hips. With her father gone, she has become a different person. She is openly defiant and much too independent for a girl of six. “Teacher said so.”

I lean down until I’m in front of her face. “Technically, yes, but we can’t just label something that easily.” I take a dandelion from her hand. “What color are these when they bloom?”

“Yellow,” she says.

“And what do you do with them?” I ask.

“I make chains out of them, I put them in my hair, I tuck them behind my ears...” she says, her excitement making her sound out of breath.

“Exactly,” I say. “And what do we do with them now, after they’ve bloomed?”

“Make wishes,” she says. Mary holds up her bouquet of dandelions and blows as hard as she can, sending white floaties into the air.

“What did you wish for?” I ask.

“That Daddy would come home today,” she says.

“Good wish,” I say. “Want to help me garden?”

“I don’t want to get my hands dirty!”