Tuesday, May 4, 2021

The Presence of Orange

On the weekend, Geoff bought a poppy flower, just one.  He left it on my kitchen counter to blossom.  I didn't realize that the petals are crinkled and almost look like paper.   I have watched it as it opens and bloom.  It has a fuzzy stem.  He asked me which color was the one that he should get.  He has a poppy on his arm.  I told him to get the red/orange one.  

The poppy on his arm is Geoff's story to tell, not mine.  But I associate the poppy with him now as his flower.  As I have watched this flower unfold, it has become a beautiful and vibrant shade of orange with yellow at its core.  I look at it and I am amazed at its simple beauty as it sits in a plastic turquoise cup.  There is something telling about it all but I can't put my finger on it.  

Orange is the color I have chosen as a wedding color.  I don't know when it started, this sudden love of orange.  Maybe it was when covid started and Janet and me would go to the park to watch the sunset every evening.  I would sit and watch the light show as the sun lowered down into the horizon to watch the beautiful colors meld.  I was in love with the sunset then.  I was hopeful and sad sometimes but then I would look at that sunset as the pandemic raged and would be comforted.  

Maybe it was earlier than that.  My first wedding to my late husband, our colors were purple and sage.  It was like a plum color mixed with a light green.  I think of grapes when I think of our wedding colors then.  There was so much planning!  I was overwhelmed and I had more than 2 years to plan a wedding.  A month before our nuptials, 9/11 happened.  Whatever I had planned seemed so small then. Regardless, in my white dress I had chosen beautiful roses.  Their base was yellow and the tips were red.  In the middle portion of the petals was the orange.  It was there even then.

Makes me think back in time to when I noticed the color.  It's funny.  I remember as a child that my favorite colors were orange and blue, like the Mets color (Geoff is a Mets fan but this girl is a Yankee).  I liked to color great portions of coloring pages with orange.  I liked mixing together the red and the yellow.  My favorite skirt was an orange.  My favorite American fruit is orange in color... the peach.  Hmmm....  

When Geoff asked me to marry him and I thought about a ceremony, back then I knew that I would have something peachy and maybe gold.  I knew I would have some aspect of orange.  Orange seemed to be there from the very beginning.  I love orange with teal or mint.  I love orange with turquoise.  Geoff took me on a date and bought me a beautiful bright Gerber daisy that was a dark orange, he had picked out a lavender flower to go with it.  It think it was then that I started thinking of orange as our color.

I am overwhelmed as the wedding date comes closer.  It's not that the wedding is coming closer.  I have other things on the many plates I have spinning that need some attention. The end of the school year approaches.  I am busy with being busy and I have a lot to check off on my checkboxes.  This morning I was overwhelmed for a moment.  Truth be told, I still feel a little overwhelmed.  Several Bible verses come to mind.  However, instead of all of that.  I raise my head toward my God.  I hear in my head the refrains of a song that has become my prayer, "Hold On To Me." 

There is an old Knock Knock joke that goes: Knock, Knock.  Who's there? Banana.  Banana Who?  Knock, Knock.  Who's there? Banana.  Banana Who?  Knock, Knock.  Whos' there?  Banana.  Banana Who?  Knock, Knock. Who's there?  Orange.  Orange Who?  Orange you glad that I didn't say Banana?  There is Orange again.  I see that there have been a bunch of bananas in my life and here is Orange disrupting it all with its warmth and vibrancy.  Maybe I should be hopeful.  And orange I'm glad?  Yes, I am.  Praise the Lord!  

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