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FLOWERY BIRTH

Flowery Birth

During King George VI's and Queen Elizabeth's tour of Canada in 1939, Her Majesty sent the bouquets presented to her in Toronto to patients in the city hospitals. In the maternity ward of St. Michael's where I was that day, each  patient received a tiny white rosebud from a special bouquet in memory of her visit.

Many years later, I gathered presents for my son's birthday, and set out to have dinner with him, his wife, and small daughter in the suburbs.

The young taxi-driver was curt to the point of surliness and began driving at a dangerous speed. To slow him down without appearing cross, I said, 'Could you take it a little easier? I've got some presents for my son's birthday today, and a few are breakable.'

'It's my birthday, too,' he said, 'and nobody's giving me any presents.' The tone was bitter.

I started to talk, and discovered that he was separated, broke, and generally fed up with life. I asked his age. 'Why you're the same age as my son,' I said. 'Where were you born?'

'Toronto.'

'What hospital?'

'St. Michael's.'

I said excitedly, 'Then your mother and I were there, giving birth to our sons, at the same time. She must have told you ............'

He broke in acidly, 'She died when I was a baby.'

I leaned forward and touched his shoulder. 'Would you like to know what it was like the day you were born? My son liked to hear it.'

He relaxed a little and nodded. I described the scene, the crowds in the streets because of the royal visit and my concern that the doctor wouldn't make it through the traffic jams. By the time I got to the Queen's bouquet of white rosebuds, we had arrived at my son's house. The driver pulled to a stop, turned around, and gazed at me with a strange and wondering look. He said, very, very, softly, 'Then, that's what the dried-up petals are in my mother's Bible. I always wondered.'             

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