I’ve told everyone of my plant-killing prowess. You also know that I have a gorgeous orchid that is just two weeks from its one-year-blooming anniversary. I even found myself offering orchid advice to a friend at the gym. It’s laughable, really.
But there is one flower in my sunny garden that absolutely takes my breath away, and all I did was put a root in the dirt and add some water.
Just one flower.
It is the most unbelievable colour of red. The darkest of blood, the brightest red of a rose, the passionate colour of love, anger, fire.
And it’s all in one flower.
It’s a dahlia, and looking at it gives my thoughts flight (like I need a catalyst).
My only question . . . how?
How is this particular flower this colour, this shape? Have you ever thought about it? How many different types of flowers there are, how many colours, varieties, shapes. . . like people, I can’t imagine any two flowers are exactly alike.
I wonder if this brilliant bloom has a spirit of its own. I wonder if, being a living thing, it knows what a beauty it is. Does it know from the time it is a tiny sprout, still in the dirt, that its petals will open to show the perfectly shaped array of flames from a fiery red sun? Does it know that its colour would make a rose wilt in shame? Does it bloom in humility, knowing it’s beautiful but keeping quiet about it?
Or does it bloom a little wider, a little more every time I walk by and stop to gaze at it?
Ironically, I believe the insects feel the same about this amazing bloom. In just less than an hour since I’d gazed at the perfect dahlia last, an insect had been given his last rites and was already 6-feet . . .-up.
My dahlia could not be considered an insect cemetery, no matter how heaven-like it must appear to any part of the critter kingdom.
So I flicked it out and it pinged off the rain barrel.
The human eye is always drawn to what it perceives as attractive, beautiful or covetous (no matter how wrong the latter is, we are still human after all). And there I was, looking at one silly flower and wishing for its beauty? No, I don’t want to be a flower. But I do want this flower to thrive and stay forever, that’s how much beauty I see in one bloom.
I guess this gives new meaning to the words “stop and smell the flowers” (roses, whatever).
But alas, there is one flaw with my perfect flower when I do stop to smell. In nature’s way of balancing, this flower is barely scented. My dahlia can’t kick the rose’s bootie in every category, can it?
While this flower blooms, I will gaze on it and let my mind wander, wondering about the mysteries of this gorgeous creation. I will wonder if the blooms that are waiting to open will be as breathtaking.
And I will wonder one more thing. . . what if the flower just wants to grow up to be a tree?
It boggles the mind.
