Irises

Spring has returned and so have the memories

When I see an iris, I think of my grandfather. The association is not in demeanor. My grandfather was a 6’4” football player, curious, dominating and oftentimes stubborn. Irises are soft and gentle. But the association remains.

My grandfather was a complicated man, but larger than life. He loved history, poetry, and classical music, especially Felix Mendelssohn. I often wonder what he would think about his favorite composer likely being Felix’s sister, Fanny, now that we attribute much of the music to her. When I started studying music academically, I’d excitedly share stories of Beethoven that I had just learned the week before. Speculations over how his deafness affected his composition and how grumpy a man he was. Everyone in the room was focused on other conversations, but time stopped when I shared music history stories with my grandfather. The only two people in the world were the two of us. He didn’t like opera, but I feel he would have made an exception for my future performances.

My father’s garden has an iris patch filled with rhizomes from my grandfather’s garden. My grandfather has been gone for over 10 years, but the irises blossom on. A trait about iris rhizomes is that they naturalize and multiply. If a patch is overcrowded due to naturalizing, the flowers won’t bloom. To keep the irises blooming, one must break up the bulbs to give the plant more space to thrive. When my father did this one year, he distributed iris bulbs to many neighbors as a gift. But the gift was truly mine. Every year, I walk through my neighborhood and down my block to see irises in bloom in the front yards. They are not just my father’s irises, but my grandfather’s. Neighbors who never met the man carry on his legacy without even knowing it. Bearded irises of purple and pink hues gently blow in the breeze of Brownstone Brooklyn. It’s finally iris season, friends.