A blessed Resurrection Day to you!

Flower Fest 

S.R. 1428

(Elanor is 7, Frodo-lad is 5, Rose is turning 3, and Merry-lad will turn 1 this year. But little Rose and Merry-lad do not come into this story, as they are napping.)

To day is like any other day, or so I should imagine, as I hear the delightful giggles of the children outside my stall. I thrust my head over the door, nodding and whickering my best greetings, and put my head down so that they may explore my face with their soft, gentle fingers.

‘You’re going to be oh-so fine, Bill!’ my little golden flower whispers. She shivers, but not from the cold – rather, it is as if delight is rising from her core, like a flock of birds bursting into flight and taking off into the bright sky. ‘Oh! So fine!’ 

‘Fine!’ echoes her little brother who bears Master’s name, though his sister invariably calls him either “Fro” or “Do” but seldom the two parts together.

As my Sam has already brushed me “to within an inch of your life, old fellow”, including polishing my hoofs, I am indeed looking quite fine this day.

‘Come now, children!’ Sam’s Rose says briskly, but her tone is warm and loving, and she comes right up to my door, as she always does, so that I may rest my face against her, and she circles my head with her arms and lays her forehead against mine for a long moment.

Sometimes late at night, we commune thus. She steals out to my stall in the little stables-and-coach-house at the end of the Row, where my Sam makes sure I am comfortably bedded deep in straw, should I wish to lie down to sleep. She whispers my name, and I rise and shake the straw from my mane and come to the door, and I offer what comfort I may. ‘He dreamed again,’ she might say, rubbing the tears from her face with my forelock, ‘horrible dreams! ...but I was able to soothe him back to sleep,’ while I stand patiently, my face pressed against her, the closest I may come to a hug. ‘O Bill! Thank you for bringing him home safe to me!’

But all is joy this morning, and bright sunshine is pouring in through the windows and open door, and I lift my head and nicker a cheerful greeting to my Sam as he enters bearing buckets, which he sets down near enough for me to snatch a mouthful of flowers – for the buckets, instead of cool, fresh-drawn water or crunchy grain, are overflowing with blooms!

‘No, Bill!’ he says, but he is laughing – all of them are laughing together! – and he moves the buckets out of my reach. To join in the jest, I lower my head to nuzzle at my little golden flower, and she giggles and fends me away with her small, soft hands.

‘Here, now,’ Sam’s Rose says, patting my neck, though her laughter belies her strict words, ‘this will never do! Come now, Sam, we mustn’t arrive belated! My dad will be here soon with the waggon to fetch the rest of us. And all of Bywater'll be waiting for you to open the celebration!’

‘I know how to keep him still,’ my Sam says, and he moves down the short corridor to the store room, and I prick my ears at the lovely sound of grain pouring into a bucket, and soon he is back, and I nod my head at him. ‘Here you are, Bill!’

And to my little golden flower, he says, ‘Now, Ellie, remember to keep your hand flat so he doesn’t crunch your fingers on accident!’

‘I’ll ‘member!’ my little golden flower responds. She reaches into the bucket of grain for a handful and holds it out to me, and I sweep it carefully from her flattened palm.

‘There now,’ my Sam says, well-pleased. ‘Let’s get on with our work, then, shall we?’

To my astonishment “our work” involves Sam’s Rose letting herself into my stall, leaving my Sam and the children outside, and commencing to comb out my mane and tail, though I am so well-kept these days, there are hardly any tangles to speak of. And then she is twining her fingers in my mane – I am not completely sure what she is doing, but as she works, she names a flower or colour and my Sam takes a stalk or three of blossoms from one of the buckets he brought in earlier and hands it to her, and I feel her tucking the blooms into my mane.

And all the while, my little golden flower is feeding me tiny handfuls of grain on her carefully-flat palm. Occasionally, little Fro-or-Do lifts a handful of his own, and because he is not so clear on flattening his palm, I lip it gently from his hand without any use of my teeth.

And now, for some reason, having worked her way through my entire mane and finishing with my forelock, Sam’s Rose takes the bucket of grain from my little golden flower and dumps it in my feedbox. Next, she slaps at my shoulder and tells me to “get around”, so I turn obligingly to bury my face in the grain, while she moves to my rear and begins pulling gently at my tail whilst naming colours or flowers to my Sam behind us.

When I have cleaned all the grain from my feedbox, licking and nuzzling the corners to make sure I have got it all, I turn my head to try and make out what this is all about. My tail is braided! And blooming for its entire length with flowers! Sam’s Rose steps back in the same moment to say, ‘There! Finished!’

‘Bill! You’re a work of art!’ my Sam says, and I come around so that I am facing my door again. When I nod my head at him, they all begin to laugh again.

I don’t know what they are finding so comical, but I so delight in their laughter that I nod my head again in vigorous agreement.

And now comes the familiar part, the saddle pad and saddle and bridle. Of course I stand as still as a statue for the tacking up, and I put my head down and open my mouth for the bit as my little golden flower and Fro-or-Do help my Sam with the bridle.

And then my Sam leads me out of my stall, and I notice now that he is not in his every day clothes but in his special clothes that he wears when we go to places crowded with many hobbits who are loud and cheerful and often shouting and laughing and waving things.

‘Your first time as Mayor to open the spring festival in Bywater!’ Sam’s Rose says in satisfaction. ‘And don’t you both look the part!’

‘Bill looks like a flower garden!’ my little golden flower sings in her fluting voice.

‘That he does, Ellie! That he does! And we couldn’t have done it without your help,’ my Sam says.

And so I nod my agreement, and when she holds out her empty palm to me, I nuzzle it as gently as I know how, just to hear her laugh.