Sunflowers, the bastions of visibility (and summer too!)
O' beautiful sunflower!
Yellow gleams from your petals
attracting sweet butterflies
and providing some a means
to obtain a fruitful life. Hello everyone, Dylan here again.
After being snowed in and being subject to the coldest weather so far this winter, it’s about time to thaw my fingers with a fresh post.
In The Magical Muse Club's latest Sunday journal prompt we were to go back into our memories and pick out one from our childhood that brings joy to us, and describe it using our senses - sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch.
Naturally, there is quite a bit I could talk about. But many of the memories that I have are quite academic in nature, which, I reckon, most of you wouldn’t want to hear, as it would be quite hard to relate to.
I could mention the various trips I took down with my parents to see my grandparents over in Charleston, SC, and the various things we did when I was down there (including the infamous trip to the Piggly Wiggly in downtown Charleston in 2010 for my grandparent's 50th anniversary where somehow we lost the crackers we bought). However, that doesn’t really ring the bell, either, owing to the scrabbles that my mother had with them in my undergrad years, which sort have ruined those memories.
Instead, let’s go back to a place that very familiar to me, which is the backyard of my childhood home.
If you go there now, you won’t find too much that’s interesting - a pool, a dilapidated deck that has clearly seen more than its fair share of Buffalo winters, and a plain grass lawn1.
But head back to my childhood during the summer, and the backyard was much more vibrant. My mother had several patches of the lawn filled with assorted plants. The wooden fence (which has since been replaced) has hooks available for hanging plants, and at one point, a lilac bush grew in the corner, near the shed.
In the southwest corner, however, was perhaps my favorite part of the yard (save for the pool). In that spot one could usually find a patch of sunflowers, alongside several other flowers and a bush as well. The sunflowers are the highlight, for good reason - come August, their blooms come out and provide a pop of color. It’s also a sign for BBQ’s from the neighbors and a sign that school is returning soon, which I would be eager to return to that routine and learn about some new, cool things.
Now, fast forward to now - late January, 2024. Plant life is dormant, the air is cold, and the threat of lake effect snow is ever present. Yet the sunflower remains.
“But how?” you may ask. There is no place suitable to put them, and I don’t have a greenhouse that can keep the conditions ideal for growing them.
Well, I shall tell you. Recently I acquired a lanyard from the Hidden Disability Sunflower project, who have designed the sunflower to serve two purposes:
To allow people with hidden disabilities (which are disabilities that one would not be able to determine simply by looking at the person, autism being one of them) to be able to show that they have a disability and that they may need assistance and/or support, and
To provide businesses the necessary training and skills to support said individuals.
The project started at the London Gatwick airport in 2016 and has since spread throughout the world, with over 230 airports around the world recognizing it, including in New York State the Syracuse airport, the Albany airport, JFK, and LaGuardia. Some universities have even joined in, including Pace University, the first in New York State to join.
In the Buffalo area, there isn’t anything yet - however, Buffalo International and Niagara Falls International are planning to launch the program soon.
Let’s see what the sunflowers bring this summer. Perhaps we’ll have some at my current place of residence, and hopefully, businesses and establishments throughout the Buffalo-Niagara area take part in this initiative. Until then… we got to get through the snowy months.
I’ll leave you with a picture of the fields of sunflowers that Sanborn has that I took back in 2021, to cheer you guys up:
That’s all for now. If you enjoyed this post, feel free to subscribe, so you don’t miss out on future posts. Or share this with your friends.
Well, save for a dirt patch where the shed used to be.