Memories of Peonies and My High-School Graduation

Memories of Peonies and
My High School Graduation

by Barbara Brabec

Peonies always remind me of my high-school graduation in the spring of 1955, from Buckley-Loda High School, Buckley, Illinois.

I'm not much of a gardener, so I was delighted to learn that there were some peony bushes on our property when we moved to our present home in Naperville, Illinois. And every year, those old peony bushes have bloomed anew in a glorious pink array I could not begin to capture with my scan of the snapshot I took last year. But you get the idea. The photo shown here is from last year's bloom, but I trust I'll see similar flowers this year.

Sometimes my peonies last for their full season, but occasionally they are beaten down by a May thunderstorm, and sometimes taken out completely by a hail storm. (We just missed such a storm a couple of days ago that dropped one-inch hail on a neighboring town.) It's May 11 as I write this, and my bushes are fully budded now. Since the crab apple tree bloomed a week earlier than usual this year, I figure my peony bushes will bloom earlier, too. And if a severe storm is predicted after the bushes are in full bloom, you can be sure I'll be out there cutting a huge bouquet to bring into the house.

Although these blooms don't last long in a pitcher, they give me enormous pleasure, and they always remind me of the old woman in my home town of Buckley whose front yard was loaded with peony bushes of varying colors. They just happened to always be in bloom as the current class was preparing for graduation, and you might say it was this kind lady's misfortune to live directly across the street from the high school.

You see, it was the practice in those days for two or three kids in the graduating class to go around town and find enough fresh flowers to fill two or more large flower baskets that would be placed on the stage. Of course, we had no money to buy flowers from the floral shop in a nearby town, so it was either find flowers for free, or do without. Because peonies were such large and colorful flowers, they were often a main part of each basket. And that dear lady across the street from the high school (I don't remember her name) with the so-obvious display of flowers in her front yard was always the first one to be asked to "donate" flowers for the baskets. And, God bless her . . . she always said yes.

Buckley is a very small town, and the old school where I got both my grade school and high-school education has been in ruins for some time. Today's children in Buckley have to be bussed to a neighboring town to get their schooling, and I can't help but wonder if today's seniors from Buckley and other small towns across the country still gather their own flowers to decorate the stage where they stand to receive their diplomas, or if this was just something quaint we used to do in Buckley back in the "good old days."

Either way, I'm glad the flower-gathering job fell to me the year I graduated because it was a joyful experience I've never forgotten, and one that firmly planted peonies in my heart forever.

I was surprised to find I actually had a picture of one of these peony baskets in my scrapbook. It's old and faded, and shot at a crooked angle--but mother was a little excited, after all, because that's me up there behind the basket, giving my first public speech as Valedictorian. I was so nervous I could hardly speak, and I sweat bullets trying to write that speech, never imaging at the time how many other speeches I would ultimately deliver (in much calmer fashion) in my home-business career.

P.S. Note that my class had a wonderful motto, and one I've often thought about as I tried to build a name for myself as a writer: BUILD FOR CHARACTER, NOT FOR FAME.

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