Monday, June 2, 2014

Word of the Week - 13

Pre-Raphaelite painting, The Soul of the Rose, by John William Waterhouse.
Word of the Week:  ROSES

For a time, until the aphids became more than anyone could bear, the porch of my childhood home was flanked by trellises through which pink climbing roses twined.   We were not a gardening people.  Everything was kept tidy by professionals who trimmed the hedges and mowed.  I was elected for raking, sweeping and weeding.  I once grew radishes and, as I remember, a few carrots for a class project.  Never again a rose of any size or description.

In the last two years, perhaps less, rose images began courting me.  And I such an easy mark.  Beauty nourishes me and there is something about the rose, followed by flowers in general, that produces tranquility as I fall asleep, a lightness of heart when I'm awake.  There is a sense akin to having made a new friend, one in whom affection and steadfastness are never doubted, whose ability to cheer does not falter.

I have reached and passed the age my sister once referred to as "powder-faced lady" from her long career in fashion and retail among the dowagers of Pasadena.  As I picture them there is a hint of rose scent in their powder.  I imagine a cut glass globe vase of the old varieties, petals loose and dreamy, not tightly furled like florist bouquets.  A few petals have fallen, attractively, to the surface of a round, marble-topped table in the foyer, standing between twin staircases that curve to a second-floor balcony.  Old world blossoms encouraged by loving hands.

So it is that I prowl Google's image library, entering the most accurate descriptions I can invent for what I hope to find, like rose-patterned socks.
It is encouraging, affirming, to fall so innocently in love with the enduring rose at an advanced age.  No doubt I am not really so newly-smitten, that this hankering, this allegiance has lurked for some time, finally stepping into the light and declaring itself as the mad crush it is. 

2 comments:

Melissa Green said...

Sigh. And so it is with the heart's affections. They are true and forever and deeply clear. As always, Marylinn, you have painted the whole picture, delicate and absolutely fearlessly, getting every detail right. May there be roses everywhere. xoxo

Marylinn Kelly said...

Melissa - Thank you. Oh, the heart's affections. Thinking, as usual, rosy thoughts. xo