They would wear their corsages to church the Sunday after a big dance. Often a big maroon or yellow mum from the Homecoming dance, or pink or yellow miniature roses festooned with satin ribbons from the Prom. Their hair in flawless page-boys, these golden girls wore their corsages casually, seemingly pinned to their coat or sweater as an after-thought on the way out the door: “Oh, the flowers still look fine, might as well wear them another day.” The perceived casualness of the gesture made it even more significant: “No big deal. I go to dances all the time. Just pinned it on my coat as a lark.”
As a pre-teen at St. James Lutheran, I looked to these sophisticated high school girls with admiration, and dreamed that some day I would be able to display this ultimate badge of femininity and lovability: the corsage. As an awkward twelve-year-old, I wanted this so much it hurt, and the sheer thought I would not be one of the lucky girls “chosen” was devastating.
I had reason to worry. Tall and gangly, funny and witty (so I was told), I was usually the one the boys wanted as their pal, not their girlfriend. I had plenty of boy time, not as much date time. As a senior, one big victory was wrangling a date to the Junior-Senior Prom. He was an older boy from church (of course), hardly a dreamboat, but willing.
And the corsage? An orchid. An orchid! In the early Sixties, orchids were not the queens of the flower kingdom, as they are now. They didn’t even seem to come in the same colors then. In fact, single blooms were often sold at the grocery store in little plastic boxes before Mother’s Day. You could pick one up for three bucks and bring home to Mom so she could — what? WEAR IT AS A CORSAGE TO CHURCH on Mother’s Day. The lucky mothers, of course, wore roses. Corsage classicism, I suppose.
Pale, whitish with a brown center and a few pink ribbons hanging down that clashed with my reddish dress, the Prom corsage screamed “generic” but at least it was a flower and it was given to me by a boy. I knew it wasn’t from the grocery store because it came in a florist’s box and Mother’s Day was long gone. Yet it had that same joyless look. And yes, even though it was a wrist corsage, I pinned the rapidly-fading thing to my coat and wore it to church the next Sunday.
One reason I like to play with memoir is that, given some distance from the earlier events of life, I can see them without the emotional intensity of the time distorting them. The poet William Wordsworth wrote that ”Poetry is emotion reflected in tranquility.” I think this means that we are often unable to truly comprehend the importance of an experience until later, when we are able to reconstruct the event in our minds in a calmer way than when we are living it.
Our faith calls to such thoughtfulness. It is important spiritual work to remember and reflect. When people ask “what to do about their spirituality?” this is one thing to do. Listen up!
When I do this kind of intentional reflection, almost always I see the figure of God there in the background – even at St James Lutheran — and I am able to detect the grace notes that tinkled in the background, though I couldn’t hear them then because I was so overwhelmed, flooded by yearning, envy, cautious hope. But now I can see the envious twelve-year-old in the pew with tenderness and compassion, as I suspect God saw her then. I know now she was loved indeed.
So today I remember that I have been given a lot of flowers (yes, even some corsages) over the years and I have bought a lot of flowers for myself. I’m thrilled every time I get them, perhaps an echo of those early times when flowers were the insignia of being loved.
No orchids, until recently.
Now it seems that orchids are the new Baby’s-breath, that wispy flower that was part of every trendy flower arrangement through the 90’s. The Department of Agriculture says that today orchids are the second-most popular potted plant, right behind poinsettias and ahead of chrysanthemums.
I have a luscious purple orchid plant on my desk today, a loving mid-January birthday gift from my daughters. It’s a beauty and I smile when I look at it, remembering ……. blessed.
See you in church.
Barbara
