When many of us are wisely taking precautions by limiting our travel and visits to family, we look for ways to connect through memory and sensory experiences that bring back loved ones who are distant or even gone forever. Such was the case of this bouquet of lilacs, which I picked for Andy in the hopes of reminding him of happy memories with his Mum, who gifted us with the original plant from which we now reap these armfuls of flowers.
A single vase is enough to fill a room with their sweet perfume – and these have other happy memories associated with them. They used to greet us every Memorial Day weekend in Ogunquit when we’d first step into our room at the Ogunquit Beach Inn. A stand of the traditional, old-fashioned New England variety lined the driveway, and if we stood on our roof-deck we could almost reach over and touch the lavender-hued blooms. The fragrance carried on the breeze – the quintessential perfume of spring, of hope, of welcome and warmth.
This year, the bouquet reminds us of those happy times, and the loss of them as well. Not in a sad sense, really, more a calming and reassuring presence of people and places we’ve known, and times touched by love and merriment.
