I miss it so baaaaad

No, this is not a horticulture blog. I've simply got Spring fever. Spring FEE-VAH.

THIS is what I'm missing right now:

Beautiful, expansive fields of Oak trees and Texas Bluebonnets. Oh how I miss Texas.

Spring was always magical in Texas...not just because of the three-inch-thick coating of yellow pollen that would be covering your car in the morning, but also for the fantastic fields of Bluebonnets that would, seemingly, pop up out of nowhere. Or...if you are a Houstonian, the fantastic highway shoulders of Bluebonnets that would, seemingly, pop up out of nowhere. They do wonders to hide and disguise the shoes, hub-caps, and trash ! (I can love Houston and be snarky simultaneously. See that?)

I really really do love these flowers, though. My mom even tried to find some to put in my wedding bouquet...in January. Yeah. We were all so surprised when she couldn't find any.

Most of my childhood memories are tinged with the deep indigo blues and whites of the Bluebonnet. They were in the background of the start of me...framing the picture, their own little character in the story of my life. They are in the pictures of me as a toddler on a trip to San Jacinto, slightly older on an excursion to Washington on the Brazos, and as an adult on a return to San Antonio for my youngest brother-in-law's Basic Training graduation.

It comforts me to know that Texas will forever be with me...alive in me...even if it is by a trailing of precious little bluebonnets.

Those of you reading (oh, that's funny. People reading this? haaaa ha haaaaa! I actually had the gall to use the plural! haa hooo heehee *wiping tears from eyes*), that are NOT Texans are probably wondering why I haven't posted any adorable childhood pictures of myself clutching reams of Texas Bluebonnets, or wearing little halos of handmade bluebonnet wreaths.

Here's why:

In Texas, you are taught from an early age (read: birth) that picking a Texas Bluebonnet, the state flower, is illegal. Should a plucking occur you are sentenced to the gallows, or some equally disasterous fate. If you even THINK about it, you've got some seriously bad juju coming your way.

Even now, after living in Oklahoma for 10 years, I can't find it in myself to pick one. I even grew a whole planter full last summer with the intent of picking EVERY SINGLE SOLITARY ONE, but couldn't bring myself to do it. I even tell Hannah to keep her grubby little hands off...'cuz girl, you don't pick the Bluebonnet. It ain't right.

Present day: I just found out that it is not, in fact, illegal to pick a Bluebonnet. My world has been shaken, and I shall never be the same. This website explains it.

You might think, new found knowledge in hand, that I could go medieval on this field. Pick the holy-crap out of it...really make up for all those years I was lied to and denied my girly right of picking and frolicking (ok, I frolicked).

But I can't.

Yet.