Morning flowers

Let me first start off by saying I'm a creature of habit. I have this tendency of finding something I like and obsessing over it.  I'm that person who plays her favorite song (of the week) on repeat until all my roommates, friends, neighbors, classmates, etc. are well aware that (insert catchy pop song of the week) is my (current) favorite song and can no longer listen to it without cringing and thinking of me.  Maybe it's my own form of "friend-security." (:

My current obsession is the meaning of flowers.  I have always admired flowers but this book I'm reading (The Language of Flowers) has taken this admiration to a new level.  On my morning walk there was a garden filled with lavender and rosemary.  Both soft purple flowers.  I thought to myself, what could lavender mean? Whatever it means, I love it.  I love it for its fragrance and beauty.  I also love it because a past amante had fields upon fields of it and would bring me sachets of lavender buds.  If you're curious, lavender means both devotion and distrust.  Those seem like contradictory meanings but I guess both can be involuntary, one can be devoted to something and distrustful simultaneously?  Devotion is a state and distrust a feeling?  I'm still pondering this one.

I kept on my way and stumbled upon a purple iris.  They're everywhere in the forest!  I looked that one up to, it means good news.  The superstitious in me thought, maybe I have some good news in my future?! The logical thought, irises bloom in Spring and it's spring.  I'll stick to superstition. 

It was much more clear today and as I turned the bend, exiting the path and onto the road parallel to the ocean, I looked back and saw the sunrise over the silhouette of cypress trees.  The ocean was still and speckled with brown seaweed, a little head popped up and I smiled at the otter.  I passed the house with the bench in the fence, the one I mentioned yesterday with all that lavender, except today I noticed another thing, behind the bench were several yellow narcissus.  Narcissus means unrequited love and selfishness.  Well that's fitting, one sits on a bench surrounded by remembrance of her/his selfishness.  That's a sad thought.  But it's also reality - people can be selfish and selfishness stems from fear.  Protecting the self is easier, safer than being vulnerable to another.

Yellow and purple flowers.  I have a theory that plants producing these colored flowers have some sort of symbiotic relationship with one another because I have observed that they grow in close proximity regularly and not only in California, I observed this in Spain, too.  Maybe the types of plants that grow in coastal environments have this characteristic.  I have not investigated the biology behind it but I stand by my theory, science could only prove this theory correct (or disprove it altogether).  But take for example the lavender and narcissus, or even a purple iris with yellow stripes on its petals, ice plant with yellow and purple flowers, etc.  

I passed a yellow mimosa (in Spanish) (and not the champagne mimosa although that conjures a beautiful image, too).  I came home and found out the name in English, silver wattle or better known by its scientific name, the acacia tree.  I looked this up and it means secret love.  How beautiful.  You could send your secret admirer a sprig of yellow mimosa. 

Mimosa or Acacia (thanks wikipedia!)

Have a beautiful day!

Mobile Documentation of Flowers, Bethesda, MD

I woke up this morning on the East Coast, I'm visiting my brother, and I decided to go for a walk.  The last time I was here, it was January and the scenery has changed quite a bit.  Being from the central coast in California, I'm not really used to season changes and I have been astounded by the differences in the trees, the flowers, the animals, not to mention, the weather!

I decided to take the same walk I would take in January, along this one residential road that spits out on both ends to freeway entrances.  The walk seemed much shorter this time, maybe that's because last time it was 35 degrees out?

I was stopped, periodically, by all of the different flowers in bloom.  I've never been one to really marvel at flowers but all of these flowers were so beautiful! The colors were so vibrant and to see them now, after being here in the winter.  I now understand why poets and writers refer to it as "the dead of winter."

I don't know if you can really tell, but this little bushel of white flowers had more fallen flowers around the bush, in the dirt, than on the actual bush.  I thought this was so beautiful.  The flowers were so soft and delicate and it made me think of a lover weeping and using these beautiful flowers to wipe his/her tears and/or blow his/her nose.  I see myself here, because I'm a big advocate of crying and a huge avid participant of the practice, except, in my case, rather than use delicate, beautiful flowers, I have kleenex, but bear with me :)

I had only taken my cell phone with me, I usually don't even do that but unlike usual, I'm traveling with other people (my parents) and we have plans and an itinerary to follow! But the good thing about having my cell phone is that I was able to take photos to share with all of you!

Pretty Purple Flowers

 

Rose 

Beauty

Is there some sort of natural or symbiotic connection between yellow and purple flowers? I always see them growing  together and for years I thought it was the taste of the gardener, wow, must have good taste, but then it occurred so many times in nature that I am convinced that this must be an act of a bigger, more tasteful gardener...