I don’t imagine it was intentional. I’m not even sure that she knew. It’s possible she felt the same way, but Mrs. Dynda never joined me as I ran through her laundry hanging on the line. But the mere fact that she allowed it — allowed me, with my chubby hands of summer youth, to dance through sheets of winded white, watching me and smiling from her open screen door, it tells me that she must have known. She must have still felt the breeze through her cotton flowered house dress — that light and airy promise that summer would never end. And in the moment, as I giggled, didn’t I hear her giggle, and possibly even her mother, Grandma Dynda, who sat beyond the screen door at the kitchen counter, still feeling the breeze of girlhood. 

The romance of life doesn’t have to end. I see that now as I fall in love with my own laundry. And not just my mother’s ruffled blouse blowing in a French whisper. Even my dishtowels. Or my sister-in-law’s basket of whites. Hands no longer chubby, but hearts that still giggle in the knowledge that it’s all a rapid and joyful dance in the wind. 

It’s a daily choice, to fall in love with your own life. Be it on VanDyke Road, or Les Jardins du Montaiguet, we can wake up and smile, and join in the dance.