Cape Myrtle

When Dad used to tell us stories, he always included a description of the landscape in which the story took place. The woods were very dense, and very dark. There was an english robin who nested in that magnolia tree each year. There were three large crepe myrtle trees on the back of the property.

Crepe Myrtle -- I imagined an old southern lady, named Myrtle, wearing a cape as she rocked in the breeze on her front porch in June. I knew it was "crepe" not "cape", but perhaps Myrtle wore a cape MADE of crepe, which would suit the playfulnees of the breeze. Her crepe cape would wisp up and into those breezes with elegant little puffs, and she would wave a Chinese paper fan across her rose petal skin as she greeted tpassers by.

Myrtle had lived in that plantation styled house for 84 years. She was born there, grew up there, and ,even as frailty started to test her old bones, she was there for the rest of it, the entire rest of it.

Her father had been a captain in the Merchant Marines and spent the better part of each year at sea. Sometimes she went along, but mostly she stayed home and loved her gardens and tended to her studies and friends. She married a dashing sailor at 17, but he died in the War some years later, and she never loved again.

She sat rocking in smart white shoes with dainty strings, and enjoyed the feeling of chiffon on her hosiery. Her hair was radiant silverwhite and perfectly coiffed and she loved this time of night. Neighbors with ice cream crusted children would pass and wave. The final deliveries of groceries and mail and ice always meant a chance for a wink from a hansom horse, or even a nice young man.

That was Myrtle and I have always wondered what happened to her, and I realized recently that I have never actually seen Crepe Myrtle, that is until i walked into one.

Well, drove into one. No, drove past one, in the parking lot of an outlet mall in Orlando. I had never seen one!! Delicate lilac blooms on long thin bowing branches with bright green paintbrush leaves.

Perfect!

That tree did look like my Myrtle after all, face to the sun and arms swaying in the breeze

So now I know what happened to her, and it is a lovely ending.