A Wonderful Memory Stays Alive
Photographs copyright: DAVID McMAHON
This morning when I checked my blog, there was a comment from Brian in Oxford, asking if my garden was full of roses. It's mid-winter here in Australia, which is why he asked. The short answer is no, there are probably less than two dozen blooms on the rose bushes. But as soon as I'd answered his question, I took the camera out into the garden as the heavy frost began to melt in the sun. This rose is called Apricot Nectar and there is a very strange annual occurrence. It is always bare by the middle of May, but a single bud appears and, right on cue, blooms on the same day every year - on my mother's death anniversary.
12 comments:
That's nice.
Here's another odd thing about a rose bush-
when my brother married, he had a single red rose sent to his bride on the morning of the wedding.
Well, she kept it and sliced the end of the stem, added some rooting powder and left it in water when they went on honeymoon.
It rooted. So she planted it out.
After a while they had a red rose bush in the garden opposite the kitchen window.
The marriage didn't last.
The weekend after she moved out, he found the rose bush- dead.
Weird, or what?
Wow.
Hi Helena,
What an amazing story.
I think it was a great effort to get a solitary rose stem to put out roots.
Thanks for sharing that with us.
Cheers
David
Hi Carol,
Stranger than fiction ....
Cheers
David
There is something about flowers! aint it! But why do drops of water amplify there beauty a thousand folds? Water does add strange beauty to photographs, even when capture a drop of water alone. But in real life, water droplets etc are not really that amazingor attractive to look at. And I dont think anyone likes to hold a wet rose. Strange!
Man, love the hell out of that second one with the drop of dew on it. Beautiful!
Both accounts of rose bushes being sensitive to particular timings are simply amazing.
Thanks for the enthralling, delicate pictures.
Rene
Hi Beast,
Very astute. Perfectly valid points all round.
We love to photograph dewy flowers, but holding them is something else all together!
Cheers
David
Hi FHB,
Funny you should say that. I had taken the first frame and was turning away, when I noticed the droplets of water from the melting frost.
That, as you point out, made an even better shot!
Cheers
David
Hi Rene,
Glad you liked the pictures.
Wasn't Helena's story amazing!
Cheers
David
Hi David
That's definitely a "wow" story -- like your mother's influencing the flower, in order to say hi to you once a year :)
(Can leap year ever throw it off a day?)
Dave,
That's a lovely pic and a wonderful story. Certain flowers remind me achingly of my mum too - she grew so many, wherever we lived - but roses were her favorite. She was always educating me as well, wherever we were, whether in the Nilgiris or the Himalayas, as to local flora.
But your story is quite perfect.
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