"Heaven in a wildflower..."

Dear Diary,

I was hoping that I would be able to get a decent photograph of a dandelion in its "puffball phase" this spring.  Those who have real lawns, I'm not one of them, curse these tiny wildflowers, call them weeds and spend countless dollars trying to eradicate them.  But I love them.  My  grandmother made wine from the flowers.  I have her hand written recipe for it and I've tried my hand at making the golden liquid which must sit in the cellar for six months before you drink it.  The leaves, when eaten early, are a great source of Vitamin A, D, C and lots more and some old-timers even made coffee from its rather large root.  It is now being sold as the new health drink.  A very multi-purpose "weed" indeed!

But I really love the dandelion when it reaches this stage.  Blowing on the seed head and letting them float away on a breeze was such fun, almost magical to a child.  We can lose that sense of wonder when we "grow up".  I hope I never do.  What I have acquired with age is a sense of the connectedness between the smallest things in Nature and the bigger picture, what Ralph Waldo Emerson called the "Over Soul".   Blake's poem seems to sum it up for me so perfectly:

To see a world in a grain of sand,
And Heaven in a wildflower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.

Amen to that.