Cut Flowers

When I was in college, my college roommate and I both had boyfriends.  And both our boyfriends liked to impress us and win our hearts by sending or bringing us flowers.  For our entire freshman year, between the two of them, our room was never one day without fresh flowers.  Even if one of our sweethearts hadn't bought flowers in a while, there were still flowers from the other one.  I never did know whether they planned it between them, or not, but my roomie and I sure did feel spoiled!

Well, I married my college sweetheart, and years later, Dearest Husband gave me flowers for Valentine's Day.  That's not really too unusual.  One might even say it's commonplace, mundane, or unimaginative.  But when he gave them to me, he told me a secret, in the way only someone with my husband's quirky sense of humor can.  He told me that this wasn't just 'flowers'...it was actually an 'ever-blooming flower vase', that flowers would continue to appear in it.....for the forseeable future.

Now, I have to admit, I fell for it....and him.  I was charmed to imagine the romance of my dear husband bringing me flowers over and again.  I somehow imagined him handing me the bouquets as one would hand a beauty queen her winning roses, in a pink haze of romance.  I imagined him down on one knee, lifting the flowers to me, as one might offer a sacrifice to a goddess or a gift to a queen.  
For those first few weeks, I couldn't stop grinning at the thought that my quiet, laid back husband had thought up such a grand and romantic gesture, all on his own, and that I, his wife and princess, had been the muse to inspire such devotion.

By the first of March, the flowers had wilted, died, and been thrown away.....but new ones appeared in the vase!  I have to admit, I was amazed to wake up one morning and find new flowers in the vase.  They were still in the cellophane wrapping, with rubber bands around their stems, waiting to be cut properly. But they were in the vase, with water.  I thought it was a sign of my sweet, charming husband just not knowing how to present them to me properly.  It's ok.  I'd have to gently teach him to make a presentation of it.  After all, that was the point, right?

Many years have gone by, and although there have been a few lean times when there were no flowers in my vase, for the vast majority of days, I have always had a beautiful bouquet of cut flowers from that day to this.  And they've taught me something.

Is my husband romantic?  Obviously. How many wives do you know who get flowers every time the old ones wilt?

Does he present my flowers to me like he's presenting gifts or sacrifices to goddesses and queens?  No.  Of course not.  Sometimes, he even off-handedly adds 'Flowers' to the grocery list when he knows I'm going, and I have to buy them for myself!   But he expects me to. That's the important part.  He wants me to have them.  Just as much as my son wanted me to have the very best dandelions and clovers picked out of the yard when he was a toddler, and with just as much love.

Are my flowers elaborate displays of adoration?  No. Most often, they are grocery store bouquets that cost less than $10.  I have learned through the years that I don't even want them to be the huge, showy displays, like one would give a beauty queen. What a revelation that was!  I've discovered that the simple, hardy flowers last so much better, and bring joy for so much longer than the showy fragile flowers. (And isn't that just like life?  Don't 'simple, hardy' people seem to last through life's trials better than 'showy, fragile' people?)  Daisies and carnations may seem like the 'cheap' flowers, but they are so cheerful, so happy, so colorful, and last so long, how could you not love them?

So, yes, I still have my ever-blooming flower vase.  Yes, it still has flowers in it every single day. And it is an everyday joy to me to see those happy flowers and know that they represent the fact that every day, in every simple way, my husband loves me, still, after all these years.