by Ann Marie Hook AMMM                              USA                                    26.04.2025

“To recognize something as beautiful, sometimes all it takes is a change of perspective.” – Christian Cooper

In the late summer of 1975, my husband, Steve, our two-year old daughter, Stephanie, and I went on a trip from our home in the desert of central New Mexico to the mountains of southern Colorado.  While driving toward home one afternoon, we wondered where we would spend the night.  Soon, we passed a hand-painted sign that read “Love’s Cabins,” with an arrow that pointed to a narrow dirt road and led up the mountain.  It looked to us like the just the place we were looking for.

We were pleased when we arrived at a group of small, rustic cabins and met Mrs. Love, an elderly widow who owned the property.  We were in luck.  She had one cabin left to rent.  It was a lovely mountain retreat and we decided to spend a few days there.  We soon came to know Mrs. Love as “Auntie Jo” and she was a wonderful, caring hostess.  She made sure we moved into a cabin with indoor plumbing as soon as possible because we had another baby on the way.  She thrilled with Stephanie’s adventures in the mountains and when Stephanie got “fussy” indoors, Auntie Jo reminded us to “take her outside and make her world bigger”.  (This advice served us well as we raised all our children.)

However, every spring I am reminded of this question that she asked me: “Do you know what my favorite flower is?”  I thought the question puzzling and had no idea of the answer because there were many beautiful flowers around the cabins.  When I told her that I did not know, she replied, “The dandelion, because it is the first flower of spring after the long hard winter. It brings with it the hope of warmth and new life.”

At first, her answer surprised me, probably because I grew up in a suburb of New York City where plush, weed-free lawns were sought after. There, dandelions were dug up and discarded as soon as possible.  However, Auntie Jo’s comment changed my perspective and I no longer look upon a dandelion as an unwanted weed.  Now, as I look through my kitchen window and see three bright, yellow dandelions in the flowerbed, I think fondly of “Auntie Jo” and am grateful for her wisdom.  Recently, I read a reflection by Joyce Rupp on perspective in which she said, “Perspective influences the way I look through what is before me and how I view what lies beyond it.”  I believe this is true not only of dandelions but of many things in life.