How can I love this spring
when it’s pulling me
through my life faster
than any time before it?
When five separate dooms
are promised this decade
and here I am, just trying
to watch a bumblebee cling
to its first purple flower.
I cannot save this world.
But look how it’s trying,
once again, to save me.
~James Pearson “This Spring”

My first close encounter with a bumblebee was when I was five.
I was wearing my swimsuit, playing in the sprinkler in our backyard.
After running and leaping in the spray, I sat down on our porch step for a moment, unaware that is precisely where a wet bumblebee chose to dry off in the sun.

Both the bumblebee and my bum had a bit of a rumble.

I jumped up, tumbled off the step crying hard, while the bumblebee buzzed off, miffed.

I mumbled and grumbled sore for several days, my feelings about bees jumbled and my confidence crumbled.

Even now, decades later, whenever I see a bumblebee, I wonder if it is a distant descendant of my bumbling stumble. I am reminded of the consequences of not paying enough attention to what I say, where I stand, and particularly where I sit in this world that is easily offended and stings hard when squished and mad.

Some painful things are best never forgotten. I’m humbled by the memory of an indignant bumblebee, who, in a teachable moment over and over, saves my fumbling bum once again.