A Garden of Memories: Honouring My Grandmother

I used to drive three hours just to place an orchid in my grandmother's hands on Mother's Day. The journey never felt long—my car filled with anticipation and that delicate flower balanced carefully on the passenger seat. 

Her face would light up when I arrived at her Older Adult Home, her eyes finding me before spotting the bloom I carried. "Is that for me?" she'd ask every time, wonder in her voice as though receiving her first flower. Dementia had taken many things, but never her smile and capacity for joy.

We had our regular routine. First came the catching up—both sitting on the textured fabric of the 70s hide-a-bed couch, sharing stories over unfortunate cookies (imagine flat fortune cookies without the fortune). She'd ask about my life, sometimes the same question three or four times, and I'd answer each time as though it were the first, watching how she nodded with the same interest, the same love.

Then would come our garden walk—her fingers gripping her walker while I moved alongside her. The gardens were amazing: lavender hydrangeas the size of dinner plates, dahlias that exploded like fireworks, and a rose section that released its perfume into the air.

"Oh my, would you look at that?" she'd exclaim, stopping before a particularly vibrant bloom. Ten minutes later, we'd circle back to the same spot, and again: "Oh my, would you look at that?" Her delight never diminished with repetition. If anything, each discovery felt more precious, watching her face transform with the same awe, again and again.

Those garden walks were a practice in patience and slowing down. There was no destination, no purpose beyond being present together. The world outside with its deadlines and demands ceased to exist in those moments. There was only my grandmother's weathered hands on her walker, the shuffling rhythm of our progress, and these bursts of colour that surrounded our path.

Time moved differently there. What might have been a ten-minute stroll for others became an hour's journey with her, but I never minded. I learned to see the garden through her eyes—not as a whole, but as a series of magnificent moments. The velvet texture of a rose petal. The intricate pattern of a dahlia's centre. The gradient shades of blue and purple hydrangea blossoms. 

Now, on days like today when Mother's Day approaches without her, I find myself moving deliberately slow. I stop to really look at flowers, hearing her voice in my mind: "Would you look at that?" And I do look—really look—the way she taught me.

The ache of missing her feels both sharp and sweet. There's pain in her absence, yes, but also gratitude for these memories. She taught me, in those slow garden walks, that beauty doesn't need to be rushed past. That the same flower, seen twice or even three times, can offer new wonder each time. That presence—true, unhurried presence—is the greatest gift we can give each other.

Today, I imagine her walking in the most magnificent garden, stopping every few steps to exclaim over each flower, her steps no longer slowed, but still taking time to notice every petal, every leaf, every miraculous moment.