Right up front, I’m a florist. So having a story about flowers isn’t a big deal. I have lots of experiences with flowers and their losely attached usual and unusual stories. Today I delivered flowers from several friends to one older gal. The Evalde tragedies are fresh in my mind and this delivery was so opposite in nature I had to mention it and how it was handled by the senders.
So, I get a call a little off hours from a woman out of town who wants to send flowers. It turns out the lady’s friend was just diagnosed with an agressive cancer and is 93. The cancer lady is not so happy and in some pain and has expressed her readiness to pass. Yes, I believe florists have 100% hairdresser status for confidences about all sorts of personal things. I digress. The bouquet is a gesture of love from friends.
Now, the note is what I really want to mention here. It was longish and since my printer was on the fritz, I wrote it by hand as I do my shorter greeting enclosure cards, so I became more closely acquainted with the message. The letter was about the groups bridge games over the years, about the company and the memories that will be fond in the future. It was a note that said in its own way, “We know you are dying, and likely soon. We love you.”
In a time when we seem to be facing death, dying, passing daily and in head shaking numbers. One million or more to covid, just in the states. 19 here, 10 there. Children, teachers, people now with no promise. Families diminished forever. We are unspeakably brave through the tears and the heart aches. It, death, seems to somehow be so common as to take the power out of the idea. So common. In our faces on the tv and internet. In our towns. We have become also more understanding of what it means to go. There is a loss of fear or stigma I can’t quite quantify. Speaking openly about death or dying wasn’t done easily or well in the past. There’s a shift I think. I imagine it’s simply demanded of us by the times. It’s a shift that I believe comes to us all naturally, eventually. It’s an understanding that some older people who play bridge have learned and show us the way with grace.
Thank you. Lovely!