Flowers as Omens

This morning I was reminded of a post from a couple years back about my stepdaughter E. To say that she, or any of the kiddos, are the same people as they were when I wrote that, would be a lie.  They have changed in ways great and small, but I remain proud of them, and I continue to love them and who they are becoming.

Anyway, E spent the night, a very welcome visit that warmed my heart, which hearkened me back to my previous post about my little sunflower.  In that post, I mention sunflowers as an omen in my life, and they never were more than in the summer of 2016.

I didn’t intend to have sunflowers in my wedding bouquet, you see.  I didn’t intend for that to be the boutonnières. Yet, when we met with the florist and I looked through his ideas, these flowers stood out to me.  He gushed over them for a September wedding, so I went with it.  Afterall, they were one of my favorite flowers, they would look lovely in my color palette, and they made me think of Mark: we grew some together a few years prior, one that managed to grow even taller than him.

Then, we had a car accident, a T-bone with the kiddos which shook me something fierce.  No one was hurt, thank God, except Cathy, my minivan.  This car accident was on Memorial Day.  By my birthday, June 13^th, we were homeless, as we had been kicked out of our apartment.  (If I knew then what I know now, this never would have happened and I would have had a lovely little lawsuit.  But I digress…) We moved our stuff to storage and put ourselves up in a crappy motel.  This is exactly 3 months before our wedding, and I have just started having gastroparesis flareups, and they’re talking layoffs at Mark’s work, so life is just FANTASTIC.

But then…

Then I get the cash back from the totaled car and it’s enough to get something a little better.  I go to a lot in Niagara Falls to check out a minivan they have, and hanging from the rearview mirror is a leather bracelet with a sunflower charm on it.  I look at it and think “cute.”  I buy the van, and that lovely lady Natasha rode with me really well, for a while.  I drove her into the motel parking lot after trolling around in the side-smashed van and felt very pleased and proud.  Then, I started looking for apartments.

Too many wanted a credit check.  Too many were too expensive for their locale and space.  Eventually, someone told me of a “for rent” sign they saw, and we called the number.  Mark was working, so I went to look at the apartment myself.  The first thing I noticed was the photo of a sunflower field that was hanging over the sink, 

The landlord and I hit it off, and he also really liked my mom, who tagged along, so we made a deal on the spot.  And when we finally moved in, that photo still sat over the sink, left behind by the previous tenants.  It remains there today.

When we got married, I was surrounded by sunflowers.  They were in the decorations, the bouquets, even on the cake.  I had come to think of them as a good omen, particularly towards mine and Mark’s life together. 

A couple of years ago, we took E to that sunflower field, and I thought of how lucky I was to have my husband and the kiddos and all this love in my life.  I thought of the time I went there with Bernie and Carey…I still think of that day as the true start of me and Careys friendship, when she went from being “Asshat’s girlfriend” to “MY friend.”  My mother buys me things with sunflowers on them, because she knows they bring me good vibes.  And oh, how I wish I had the space to grow some again!

Anyway, I just think that they are a good omen in my life, aside from the fact they bring sunshine with them wherever they go.  I adore driving past a sunflower field.  I love when Mark gets me a bouquet of them.  I can even say I have spent over an hour looking at different varieties on the internet. 

It’s just a good flower, y’know?

Over 6 ft and still hadn’t bloomed!

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