May Day

Happy May Day!  May Day holds wonderful memories for me. I grew up on a farm outside Brock, Nebraska, and the Brock School made May Day such wonderful fun.  Of course we had our May baskets all made before the first day of May.  On the day itself, there was the dancing around the Maypole, and the choosing the king and queen of the May with their attendents.  Two years in a row my oldest brother was chosen as king, in both his junior and senior years of high school.  The year he was a senior, I was  in first grade and was one of the attendents.  My mother made me a beautiful pink dress, which I called my "Cinderella dress", and of course the beautiful flowers in the baskets we carried made any little girl feel like a princess!

Yet the most exciting thing of all was taking the baskets of May flowers to family.  My parents drove us the their houses, and we would place a basket by the door, knock, and run away as fast as our little legs could carry us, and wait to see the surprised faces.  My Granmother O'Harra, whom we all affectionally called, Muzzy, made everything fun.  She would put her hands over her mouth, and say, rather loudly, for she had to know we hid near her, "Oh, I wonder who could have left this beautiful May basket for me? I hope you know you made me happy?"

Alas, the day is no longer celebrated in this way, which I think is a pity. May Day reminded us that spring offered hope, the blooming of life, the joy of friendships and family, and it offered a break in a world weary of winter, and longing for joys of summer to come. 

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