Sunday — A Taste of Flava

Three Vases of Dead Flowers 🤣

I currently have three vases of dead flowers sitting in my home.

Yes.

Three. 🤣

They were birthday flowers, and I didn’t purposely dry them.

I just didn’t care to care for them. 😂

Now, that may sound strange coming from someone who was once part of the floral industry.

There was a time when I knew exactly what to do with fresh flowers.

Trim the stems.

Change the water.

Remove what was dying.

Rearrange what was left.

I would even purposely dry certain flowers and turn them into beautiful wreaths and decorations.

I appreciated the entire process.

But somewhere along the way, something changed.

Me.

The older I get, the less excited I am about receiving fresh flowers.

Don’t get me wrong.

I absolutely appreciate the thought behind them.

When someone sends me flowers, I know they’re saying:

I thought about you.

I wanted to celebrate you.

I wanted to make you smile.

And THAT means something to me.

But now when I look at a beautiful arrangement, another little voice in my head might be saying…

“Do you know how much they probably paid for those flowers?” 🤣

Because flowers aren’t cheap.

And after a matter of days?

They’re gone.

Then there’s the maintenance.

Fresh flowers are beautiful, but those little suckers require some attention. 😂

Water needs changing.

Stems may need trimming.

Dead flowers need removing.

Petals start dropping.

Eventually the vase needs cleaning.

And these days, getting up and down to pamper flowers isn’t something I particularly want to spend my energy doing.

There was a time when I wouldn’t have thought twice about it.

Today?

Girl, give me something I don’t have to take care of. 🤣

That’s one of those little things about getting older that I find interesting.

Sometimes what we value changes.

What once brought us tremendous pleasure may not mean the same thing anymore.

That doesn’t make what we enjoyed before any less meaningful.

It just means we’re in a different season.

I’ve also been thinking about the beauty of flowers themselves.

Maybe flowers aren’t supposed to last forever.

Maybe part of what makes them beautiful is knowing they won’t.

They bloom.

We enjoy them.

They begin to fade.

And eventually, we let them go.

That made me think about something bigger.

Do we have to preserve everything beautiful just because it was beautiful?

Maybe not.

Some things come into our lives for a season.

A moment.

An experience.

A memory.

We can appreciate what they gave us without needing to hold onto them forever.

Those birthday flowers did exactly what they were supposed to do.

Someone thought enough about me to send them.

They arrived beautiful.

I looked at them.

I smiled.

I appreciated the people who sent them.

They were part of celebrating another year of my life.

And now?

They’re dead. 🤣🤣🤣

I don’t need to turn them into wreaths.

I don’t need to preserve every petal.

I don’t need to figure out some elaborate craft project because once upon a time Lady Flava would have done that.

I can simply say:

Thank you. You were beautiful. I enjoyed you. And now it’s time for you to go.

Actually…

I probably should have said that a couple weeks ago. 🤣

Those three vases have been sitting there patiently waiting for me to reach this revelation.

Maybe after I finish writing this, I’ll finally throw them away.

Maybe. 😂

Because apparently I’ve become the woman who doesn’t particularly want fresh flowers anymore…

but will leave the dead ones sitting around for weeks.

Make THAT make sense. 🤣

But maybe that’s A Taste of Flava too.

We’re constantly changing.

Sometimes we don’t even notice something about ourselves has changed until three vases of dead flowers are staring us right in the face.

So here’s my Sunday question:

Is there something you once loved receiving or doing that simply doesn’t bring you the same joy anymore?

And are you okay admitting that your tastes, priorities and values have changed?

I am.

Now somebody remind me to go throw these flowers away. 🤣🌻

From Flava in Her Tower 🌻