1987 — the year of living miserably (sort of) — Part 1: flower power

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.                   Charles Dickens, “A Tale of Two Cities”

A while back, I wrote a post about one of my most memorable New Year’s Eves.  That evening was the beginning of a very long year apart.  One of the reasons we chose the unaccompanied assignment to the USS LaSalle was we wanted to save money.   We had a certain amount of credit card debt that we wanted to retire, and after that was paid we had the goal of saving $10,000 so that we would have a down payment with which to buy a house.  In order to accomplish this, we both were on a budget for the duration.   Jim got $200 a month for spending money, which had to cover all souvenirs, his cigarettes, any dining out or drinks, and any other incidentals. 

Back in my bedroom there is a brass music stand that serves as the platform for a collection of ribbons.   It is a pretty amazing grouping, since it contains the ribbons from every bouquet of flowers I have ever received from Jim.   There are sundry other ribbons in the collection:   the ribbon that decorated the bottle of champagne that was given to us when he retired from the Navy, a ribbon from my 50th birthday party, the big red bow that decorated the first Marvin when Jim gave him to me.

I started collecting ribbons before we were married, and one of the most important ribbons in the collection came from my wedding bouquet.  There was a particular florist that Jim tended to frequent.   When he got off work, he would stop on his way home.   Our bank was right there, he would visit the ATM and get money.   Then he would stop in the Irving Club and have a drink.   After he had consumed this important de-stressing compound, he would walk up the street to the Sunset Super, a wonderful little supermarket that had a full service butcher run by Petrini’s, and select what he was going to prepare for our evening repast.   There was a great cheese shop a couple of doors up, and about a block from the bank was his favorite florist.

The florist shop was run by a pair of very charming, extremely gay men, who were true artists in flowers.   They were entranced by the extreme romance of the whole giving flowers thing, and they approved of Jim and his propensity for walking into their refrigerator and selecting three or four flowers to bring to his lady.   Generally when he arrived to buy flowers he was in uniform, since he had just gotten off work, and he and the florists had a great relationship.   He knew they were gay, of course, it was impossible to miss, they knew he knew, and that he didn’t care.   The three of them joked around together, they approved of him buying flowers for his lady, and they thought he was cute.   There is something about a man in uniform. . .   When we got married, of course we had them do our wedding flowers, and we more than got our money’s worth.  

I’m not sure why Jim felt that when he was going to be gone for a whole year I should not suffer from a lack of flowers.    Most sailors who are preparing for departure are thinking about allotments, wills, storing their vehicles, making sure they have enough uniforms and other such prosaic things.   My husband went to his florists and asked them what he could do to make sure that I would receive flowers regularly even though he was on the opposite side of the world.   Between the three of them, they decided that he would send them a check accompanied by a card he had written out to go with the flowers, and insturctions of what sort of flowers he wanted me to have.    They provided him with a selection of blank florist cards, and their address.

These men were so amazed and caught up in the whole romance of it all, that every time I received flowers from Jim while he was gone they went WAY out of their way to provide a high quality production.   I guess it was their way of supporting the troops.   When Jim got back, I asked him how much money he usually sent them, and he replied, “Oh, about twenty-five dollars.”   His instructions for the spring bouquet was to send me a selection of spring flowers, unarranged since I liked to arrange them myself.   What I got was a huge box that contained 5 stalks of gladiolas, a dozen daffodils, a dozen tulips in assorted colors, two large bunches of freesias, two stems of tuberose, 9 dutch irises, some mini carnations, ferns and baby’s breath for fillers.   All for $25.00

For my birthday he ordered up roses.   I’m not sure how the florists discovered how old I was going to be, I think they may have called the Conservatory for that information, since that was where that particular bouquet was to be delivered.   Anyway, for his $25 I received a stunning arrangement of 34 red and white roses, one for every year of my life.

The other arrangements were similary lavish.

All those flowers, all those little envelopes.  I still have the cards.  And remember, it came out of his monthly allotment of spending money.