It’s a dull day here, today. Grey and overcast, with a threat of thunderstorms. I woke up to the sound of rain rat-tat-tatting against my windows; and it’s been on again, off again ever since. God knows we need some rain. We’ve had an exceptionally hot, humid and dry summer, in Toronto. But still, it’s dingy out there.
Which has, for some inexplicable reason, made me think of flowers. Probably because the sight of even a single bloom can brighten any day; and any mood. No matter how dark. I love all flowers. From the simplest daisies to masses of brightly-coloured bougainvillea, trailing willy-nilly over fences and walls. From tulips that droop gently over the side of a vase, to window boxes crammed full of cascading geraniums and petunias. Unassuming garden variety posies. More exotic varieties, like orchids and calla lilies. I even like buttercups.
Sometimes all it takes to make me happy are a couple of sunflowers, cheering me on. Sometimes I crave something much more over the top — like dozens of the palest of blush-coloured roses, informally ‘plopped’ into an old cut glass bowl my grandmother gave me. And sometimes I want to play, mixing all kinds of different flowers together, in colours that range from fuchsia to scarlet to burgundy to almost black — shoving the whole bunch of them into a shocking, deep turquoise pottery pitcher. It all depends on my mood.
But all this talk about flowers has sparked a memory, of a glorious month-long trip I took to India a few years ago. Talk about flowers!
I could write dozens of stories about that trip (and perhaps I will), but this time I’m confining myself to an experience I had on our last day there. We were in the Continue reading →
any snow or rain. But although we had another mild winter this year, we have had more than our fair share of rain — too much, in fact; and it’s caused havoc. Not good.
365 And Counting 