I am blessed with a mate who believes in the power of flowers. From the days of our earliest relationship, Nate often walked through the front door with a bouquet. He realized, early-on, how flowers lifted me. “I don’t get it,” he’d say, “but I can do it.” That’s a wise husband.

When disappointments have come, he’s helped mitigate their impact by buying a bouquet on his way home from work. I picture other women on the train noticing the wrapped bouquet on Nate’s lap. “Lucky someone,” they think. “She’s getting flowers.”

There have been seasons when our finances were so tight, a store-bought bouquet would break our bank. At those times I’ve said to Nate, “No flowers for a while, Dear. Really.” How many wives have to ask their husbands to stop bringing flowers to them?

Last spring we were at the financial bottom. After enduring an excruciatingly long wait to sell our house without any prospective buyers even still, I said, “The yard will be full of perennial flowers this summer. How ‘bout we enjoy those rather than the fancy bouquets you usually bring?”

He balked, having grown to love the process of choosing which flowers to buy, pondering what colors to put together and thinking forward to my delight in receiving them. Once he came home with peach colored roses edged in dark orange. “Remember?” he quizzed. “I got you this kind for our 20^th anniversary.” I did remember and was hugely flattered that he did, too.

Last summer, though, he finally agreed to pass by the flower shop without stopping, and I made a fresh effort to make yard-flower bouquets: golden daffodils, white crabapple blossoms, lavender lilacs, yellow iris, pink plum branches, burgundy peonies, even the tall stalks of tiny purple “blossomettes” that grew from the hosta plants.

By August, when our gardens were flagging, I went on walks to gather weed-flowers for our vases. Dad always admired the staying power of weed-flowers and even thought about planting a garden of his favorites. “They have roots a yard long that can withstand any drought,” he’d say. If you’ve ever tried to uproot a dandelion, you know that.

Today I went walking (with my scissors), looking for a bouquet of weed-flowers. If Dad was still alive, he’d smile with affirmation at the gorgeous arrangement now on my table. Spectacular Queen Anne’s Lace, growing rampantly in every empty lot in our area, is fit for a bridal bouquet. (See picture above.) As Dad always mused, “Who labeled some weeds and some not?”

One day Nate may again bring me frequent bouquets of florist-bought flowers. But til then, the woods and empty lots can be my suppliers.