At the perimeter of the back yard of my childhood home there were ten large lilac bushes all in a row. They grew to be over seven feet tall and in between prunings provided a safe, snug den for me at their base.
Like every child, there were times I needed to be alone - away from my younger sister, away from my friends, away from my parents. I could crawl under the lilacs and sit, knees drawn up to my chin, in a space big enough for only me to spin my childhood fantasies.
The branches, heavy with the weight of rain soaked flowers, would arch to nearly the ground, hiding me from the world. The scent of the lilacs were intoxicating and I could not imagine a more perfect place on God's earth.
I could hear the drone of someone's lawn mower several yards away, accompanied by the sound of an insect buzzing somewhere in the foliage. The screen door would slam as my mother made her way to the clothes line with a basket of wet laundry, unaware of my presence just a few feet away. My plaid PF Flyers, only two weeks old were already soiled with grass stains and dirt and my short set (a hand-me-down from my cousin) was already missing a button from the blouse.
But here, in my lilac hideaway, I was a world away. I could be Meg from A Wrinkle in Time or Sam Gribley's friend from My Side of the Mountain. I could be anyone - a poet, the best softball player at school, the owner of a beautiful black horse named Sabre.
But defintely not just a plain young girl with freckles in an ill-fitting short set hiding under the lilacs.
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