Maybe you think this is all a little dark? I don’t blame you. But two weeks into summer, two days into summer break, it somehow feels as if I am looking at the world through the bottom of a peephole. Like those homemade cereal-box glasses we made as kids for the solar eclipse. Don’t stare right into it. Look away.

But at this moment, trying to grasp a thought, like the address I am trying to remember, is like trying to claw myself one of those stuffed animals in a glass case at the Chuck E. Cheese. There. Almost there. I have it. AH! Gone! Dropped it.

Okay, the address is 221 Stanton Hope Lane. Scarlett Mills, Pennsylvania. Yes, that is the address of my engagement. There will be no cell phone service, I was warned. I said I could just put the address in my phone. But somehow that was preposterous. I was instructed to write it down.

And here, standing in front of 221 Stanton Hope Lane, the weight of my commitment hits me. Maybe it’s the giant gray stones at the base of the house. Or the green elm towering into the sky. Or the maple trees on the lawn looking a thousand years old.

This is a big, big place.

It hadn’t looked that big, as I remember it.

Yes, I admit, it’s a little crazy how this all came about. You see, I had intended on arriving at my final destination, Bryn Mawr College, before looking for work. Yes, that seemed obvious.

But somehow, when the train stopped at Scarlett Mills, the petunias and daffodils surrounding the little platform had seemed to be some kind of sign. You see, my name is Daffodil. So, in my mind, I suddenly felt like this was the place. Had to be the place. This was my station.

And in a rash kind of decision, the type of decision I am prone and enthusiastic to make, I jumped out of the train and onto the petunia- and daffodil-decorated platform. When I realized the college was farther up the line, I decided to make lemonade, and began my search for some kind of job. A summer job. A job that would, hopefully, pay me a handsome sum before the advent of September and my new life. The one with which I’d happily replace my old one.

Now, I know I do not get an A for planning, here. But, somehow, as these things sometimes miraculously do . . . it worked out.

Yes, going door-to-door, knocking at every address in town seemed like a positively idiotic plan. Especially with the June humidity and the bugs swarming around me and not even a one, not one door opening. (And, let’s be honest, folks. I know some of those people were actually inside, ignoring me.)

But there was a little bit of luck, you see, just a little synchronicity that somehow led me to the farther reaches of town, even to the outskirts, and to a sweet little stone house up a long winding road. There were daffodils here, too. So you see, it was destined. And, even though it appeared little at first, as I grew closer I realized how, exactly, imposing this home was.