The world was moving at that ridiculous pace it always does when you're riding in a car. In contrast, I felt like my brain was moving painfully slow. Unable to take in everything that I was seeing, I only noticed a flash of yellow that I could not recall seeing in the yard before. My head jerked back in an attempt to get an identifying look. It was too late. We had already pulled into the driveway. I immediately went to go see what the splash of color was.

A lone yellow daffodil had grown out of the middle of our lawn without me even realizing it. Simply scowling at it, I stood there for a long time. Daffodils have a very interesting and unique bloom. At first it resembled an old time telephone to me, until the wind coaxed it into a steady bob. Then it acted more like a mouth. Mesmerizing me with the story it slowly tried to tell.
None of my neighbors had daffodils. I didn't have daffodils. Oh I had numerous other flowers. Lilies, tulips, roses, and a few whose names had gradually slipped away from me, but never any daffodils. A fascinated sort of respect willed me to sit down in front of the daffodil. Its little mouth must have had vast experience to share. For even as a seed it must have traveled a great distance; traveled to and then grew successfully in the compilation of weeds I call my lawn. I wondered how the little seed had survived without regular watering or nutrient-rich soil. I could only laugh at how I spent so much time tending to my flowers in their specific plots of land, to have a just as lovely flower make its own way in the middle of the yard. The daffodil had fought its way through the roots of weeds to gain a foothold in the unwelcoming clay. Even now, the winds of a coming storm whipped it towards the ground, but never into it. The daffodil refused to bow down and grovel for anyone. It would not kiss the dirt. The wind would seem to give up and the daffodil would again hold its head high. Then the dark gust would return, howling curses at the flower that refused to give in.

Such is life, whether it be a daffodil's or a human's. You can be blown into situations where you are expected to fail. Maybe there are poor foundations. Maybe it doesn't rain enough. Maybe you're different than everyone else. Maybe maybe maybe, so what? The reality is you're not going to get a perfectly cultivated piece of land where someone pulls the weeds before they can absorb your periodically supplied water. It's not always going to be a sunny spring day. There will be summer storms. There will be cold snaps. The world is an unpredictable place, where you only have control over yourself. You can rise above adversity and be the beautiful daffodil in the yard of weeds, or you can bow down and kiss the dirt.