Spring has filled my corner of America with glorious blooms, fragrances, and color. Spring is one of the many times I'm delighted to live in the South. My cousins in Montana only dream of spring as the ice thaws and snow is still predicted in April.

In my state of North Carolina, by April the cherry trees are laden with soft cloud-like blooms, and the azaleas are arrays of deep pink and red. The air is warm without humidity (there will be plenty of that in July) and the cool nights are a chorus of singing crickets underneath shimmering stars. The regal irises stand tall in gardens on my street, causing friends to say with awe, "What pretty irises," and "Those are beautiful."

Gradually, with each new spring, I've been able to embrace the season of new beginnings. However, it will never be as it was when he was alive. For spring will always hold significant reflections of yesterdays. And the iris will be part of those stories that remind me of a blond-haired boy wound up with silliness and a smile that melted my heart.

Daniel grew a lump on his neck in the spring of 1996. A surgeon said he could lance it open and drain it - a simple surgery. As we met with the doctor in his office, energetic three-year-old Daniel took off to survey the clinic for a bathroom.

Minutes later a couple gently entered the doctor's office. "Is anyone here named Iris?" the woman asked.

We shook our heads and continued to talk with the doctor.

Soon the couple came back. Tentatively the woman said, "A little boy is in the men's bathroom. His bare bottom is in the air and he wants his mommy to wipe him. He says her name is Iris."

Bottom in the air? Well, that must be my Daniel! I'm sure his hands are resting on the bathroom floor, just like where he places them at home.

My husband went to the men's bathroom to take care of Daniel's bottom. And I thought it made perfect sense that Daniel had made my name Alice sound like Iris.

We've laughed about Iris ever since.

I started a collection of irises -- pens, cards, note pads. Van Gogh's timeless portrait of irises holds comfort for me and each time I view it I'm certain; it was painted for Daniel and me.

Under the Expanded Sky

Educating Merna

Crying With My Ancestors

Opening Grief as a Gift

Living Life from the Graveyard

Surviving the Tinsel

Trees of the Ice Storm

Is There Laughter After Death?

Whatever Happened to the Old?

Out of My Comfort Zone

I Am Not Cheese

As The Sixth Year Approaches

The Dirty Green Van

Judging Pain?

Grief Meets the Answering Machine

Closets, Revisited

Unwinding with a Pen

There is Nothing Wrong with You!

Scared to Death of Dying and Denying Grief

The Night the Christmas Tree Fell

Baking Bereavement Bread

For the Love of Mothers

Bereaved Eyes

A Wealthy Life

The Power of Photographs

Fragrance of Marigolds

And when spring comes and I see those tall flowers with their thick stems and lovely blooms -- yellow, purple, some bearded with pink and gold -- I think of Daniel whose lump turned out to be cancer. I think of how he was diagnosed one spring and gone the next. There is a constant ache because he's unable to enjoy all the funny stories we continue to tell about him.

Sometimes after an afternoon of rain, the irises in my garden bend over, their tender faces tilting near the moist soil. That's when I can hear a little boy calling out to his mama, "Wipe me!" This boy calls his mama Iris.

I brush away a tear, then smile.

In Heaven, among an abundance of irises, no doubt, Daniel must be smiling, too.