Dandelion Season -- When the Wind Takes What You Love

Looking at the photo of the dandelion that gets blown away to the wind, it brings tears to my eyes.

It is such a quiet image -- almost gentle.

And yet it feels violent in a way no one talks about.

The stem is still there.
The root is still anchored.
But pieces of it are being carried off -- one by one -- by something it cannot control.

That is what this season of my life feels like.

I am still here.
Still a mother.
Still loving with the same heart that once tucked them into bed and prayed over their sleeping faces.

But pieces of my heart feel like they are being lifted away from me.

Conversations that no longer happen.
Messages that go unanswered.
Silence that stretches longer than it should.

It feels like standing still while the wind decides what it will take.

There is something unbearably sad about a dandelion in that moment.

When it is bright yellow, it is alive and unapologetic.
When it turns white and feathery, it becomes fragile -- temporary -- almost waiting.

And then someone blows.

Or the wind does.

And it scatters.

You do not know where the seeds will land.
You do not know if they will grow.
You only know the flower will never look the same again.

I look at that image and I see myself.

Not destroyed.

But changed.

Not uprooted.

But altered.

There is grief in that.

Because I did not expect motherhood to feel like this -- like watching pieces of my own heart drift farther and farther away.

I did not expect love to feel unanswered.

I did not expect to stand rooted while feeling emptied.

And yet, there is something else in that image.

The dandelion is not dying.

It is multiplying.

Every seed that leaves carries the possibility of life somewhere unseen.

Maybe that is what love is, too.

Maybe the love I poured into my children did not vanish.
Maybe it is still traveling -- carried by time, by memory, by something I cannot see.

Maybe one day it will land softly in their understanding.
Maybe one day it will grow back toward me.

Perhaps this is what it means to be part of God’s bouquet -- to bloom, to scatter, to trust that even what is carried away is still held within a larger design.

Right now, I do not know.

Right now, I only know the ache of watching the wind take what I want to hold.

But I am still standing.

Rooted.

Waiting.

And if the dandelion can release its seeds without knowing where they will land,
maybe I can release my fear without knowing how this story ends.

Even in scattering, there is hope.

Even in letting go, there is faith.

And even with tears in my eyes,
I am still here.

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God’s Bouquet is where I anchor my hope -- you can find it waiting on the right side bar of this blog.