Category Archives: Flowers

At the crux of nature and art is the featured painting by Matisse. Currently on exhibit at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, it’s a relatively calm piece, color-wise, for the artist, but one that perfectly captures the subtle shades of a bush known less for showmanship and more for fragrance. Beyond the meeting of art and nature, there is the matter of perfume – a very important matter indeed.

Lilacs seem to remind many people of their childhood, and I’m no exception. I distinctly remember the lilac bushes in our front and back yards, and the way their flowers held the water so often falling from the sky at this time of the year. Their heart-shaped leaves were the purest form of green (enjoy them now, as they usually succumb to mildew once the humidity of summer hits).

Matisse captured their subtlety in a vase, and the accompanying gray atmosphere that early spring sometimes signifies. Rain abounds during lilac season, and their subtle shades work well against a dull sky. The softness of their visage deceptively belies the perfume they produce, and it is this exquisite fragrance that pulls me, and so many others, blissfully back to childhood, and back to the beginning.

Of a season.

Of a life.

Of a lilac.

In a snowdrop,

In a line of daffodils breaking through the ground,

In a bright white Lenten rose.

The sights of the season are glorious to behold.

Tulipmania is about to begin all over again, and at the perfect time. The weather, after teasing us with an 85 degree Easter Sunday, has returned to a more normal, albeit sadly cooler, state. That’s where it should be, and as long as we don’t have a stretch of hard freezes, I’m ok with that. Besides, even if the sun fails to shine this week, I’ll have the memory of this tulip in my pocket. As you can see, it captured a little bit of sunshine within its precious petals. It’s a thrill to find those moments when nature echoes nature, reflecting its own majesty and repeating motifs in clever ways. Nature has its own inside jokes, its own winks and nods.

Certain flowers have the power to cheer. For me, tulips are first. They always make me smile. Narcissus are a close second, and maybe iris. No, it’s got to be peonies – though when I see and sniff a peony there is more than simple cheer – there are deeper emotions involved in a peony. So while it may be my favorite flower, the peony isn’t the first to cheer me. I know daisies make Suzie and JoAnn happy, and the Gerbera daisy tickles my friend Sherri’s fancy. While I’ve never grown them, ranunculus, with their deliciously twisted name, have always cheered me upon sight, though I’ve yet to buy a bunch. Maybe that will change soon. We all need a little cheer these days. In the meantime, here’s the best I can do.

This happy little daffodil (the name of which some may find objection at, but as long as they’re bright and lightly-scented, I don’t care what you call them) was part of a bouquet of blooms I picked up a couple of weeks ago. We’re just starting to see their outside cousins rise up from the chilly ground. I’m still hesitant to give everything over to spring just yet (too great a chance for a snowstorm) and part of me has halted any celebratory sigh of relief, especially when I think back to last year’s banner crop of lilac blooms that was instantly decimated by a late-season freeze. Mother Nature is to be honored, but never trusted. Unless you’re placing trust in fickleness and unpredictability.

Tom Ford did a few floral scents in his Jardin series, inspired by these spring blooms, none of which was very impressive. While some flowers lend themselves to lasting scents (jasmine, tuberose, gardenia) these early bloomers don’t give it up as easily. His jonquil and hyacinth attempts did not connect for me – spring is about something lighter, and Ford’s private Blends (with the possible exception of the summer-based Portofino collection) have too much oomph and headiness to translate the delicacy of the spring bulbs.

For me, the only way to smell these properly is to take an early season stroll and feel the soft dampness of a spring earth beneath your feet. The air should be almost as wet as the ground, and as you approach a swath of narcissus, you will smell their delicate sweetness. You should get your knees wet as you kneel beside their fragrant beauty, and it will always be worth it. Forever after, that memory will be conjured -in every passing grocery market bucket, in every fancy hotel lobby that serves up seasonal blooms, you will be brought back to the happiest time of the year when you sniff them again: spring.

A sigh, then, before the very last entries for The Delusional Grandeur Tour.

A pause, if you will, before we careen into the final plunge of this ride.

A moment, tucked into the end, and saved just for us.

For the ones who remain.

You know who you are.

THE DELUSIONAL GRANDEUR TOUR: LAST STAND OF A ROCK STAR

A simple bouquet for your midday contemplation, in hot pink and evergreen.

A more colorful version of this companion study in simplicity.

As a wise woman once said, pink goes good with green.

A scent leading to a memory.

Like an obedient dog, I follow.

To a fall, and a trailer, far out in the country.

The sweetness of the paperwhite narcissus subsides, and the acrid smell of burning leaves explains the smoky air.

In a claustrophobic room, a pile of kittens suckles their mother.

I pick the one with tiger stripes.

A mischievous little thing.

You never know what the kitten will become.

More importantly, you never know what’s on the mind of a cat.

The fragrance fades.

The memory recedes.

I will revisit it another time.

A proper tablescape is something I’ve tended to ignore up until recent years, and even now I only do such a thing partly out of an over-the-top joke for Suzie whenever she comes over. (There is no one less inclined to craft a tablescape than Suzie. I don’t think she owns a tablecloth, much less anything to go on it for decorative purposes.) So whenever she visits for dinner, I try to create at least one ridiculous sight on the dining room table.

For this New Year’s Eve table, coming as it did in the aftermath of the Christmas holiday, I wanted a simple and elegant wintry scene. Our backyard stand of Steeplechase thuja provided the evergreen sprigs that work surprisingly well as a miniature forest and anchoring greenery for a bunch of creamy single stock flowers.

They rise in a manner reminiscent of primroses, and the soft, subtle flower form is a deceptive veil for the potent sweet aroma they give off.

The greenery here – both on the stock and the scales of the thuja – is a major component, and my favorite part of this collection. A few little glasses hold one or two fronds each of the thuja, but taken together they create an impact greater than their individual parts.

If you lean in, you can get lost in the little forest of sweet-smelling blooms.

Winter keeps its cozy secrets.

Winter is the evergreen before the blooms.

This is the time of the year when the calendar gets filled with parties and events, and the dinners and get-togethers that make the early descent of darkness a bearable thing until the days start to get longer again. There is a sense of excitement in the cold air, accented by the sparkle of holiday lights, the flickering of candles, the Christmas trees that illuminate the darker corners of our homes. And then there is the merry-making and cheerful greetings as friends and family gather to be together at this tail-end of the calendar year. Yet for all of that, I find my most peaceful and tranquil moments in the early morning, after a night out, when the sun is streaming into the living room. Everyone else in the house is asleep, and I pad quietly out to the kitchen to make a cup of green tea.

A recording of a flute and koto plays in the background, and a stick of Japanese incense burns by the window. A few spires of paperwhite narcissus rise from their glass bowls, their heady fragrance mingling with the incense in unlikely but fine fashion. It is a moment of peace.

I sit on a leopard-patterned chair that allows a full view of my favorite room. A Korean tansu rises to my right. A clown loach swims idly around the aquarium to my left. My eyes follow the rising stream of burning incense in the sunlight.

Soon, the house will wake. Guests will shake off the revelry of the previous evening. I’ll press a button and coffee will start brewing. The holiday season will pick up where it left off. Yet I’ll have had my moment, and I’ll want to join in the fun again.

The hydrangeas put in a last minute show this year, sending up a final group of blooms just as the first frosts were hitting. I managed to save a nice set of them before a killing frost hit a week ago. Miraculously, our ferns on the front porch are still going strong, their protected alcove no doubt aiding in their survival this late into the season. As for the hydrangeas, they would not have lasted the night, so I brought them in, and they’ve lasted more than several nights.