Brave Flowers

Last night while RantWoman was out in pursuit of her weekly $20-bananas market basket, she discovered very brave orchids! After listening all day to flower-themed broadcast involving a different flower, RantWoman thinks Brave Flowers is a tolerable way to begin.

The supermarket where RantWoman most often goes on her late-night forays has a wall of floral thingies right next to the door where RantWoman usually enters. RantWoman seldom buys flowers from this supermarket because she usually finds its offerings overpriced and already past their prime. RantWoman's main concern is usually to get past this wall of pollen and fragrance without sneezing, running over a panhandler outside the store with a shopping cart or colliding with whoever is bobbing and weaving around the entryway. Does this wall of pollen problem matter enough that RantWoman would spend more money if it were fixed? Alas, probably not.

Last night RantWoman shopped faster than sometimes. She got through the checkout, seized the precious bananas to pack them herself as usual, and pulled away from the checkstand to make her usual transaction notes. It was here, atop the cigarette case, next to the Lotto tickets, the change-counting machine, and the water dispenser that RantWoman made a most unlikely discovery. There was a parade of solitary orchids, each in its own thin vase bravely presenting themselves for purchase.

At first RantWoman was unsure of what she was seeing, but then she saw more of the incongruous orchids. RantWoman looked and looked and finally located a price, suitably orchid-like, in keeping with the prices of other flora at the place. Of course, this price was completely out of any range RantWoman would have been interested in, so much as she might have liked to rescue at least one of the delicate blooms from its ignominious presentation, RantWoman had to leave and hope others better fortified financially would come along and step up to the task.

At least with supermarket orchids, someone could step up. With state flowers whose names got slapped blandly onto a public school and then forever associated with one day of horrible events there, brave flowers are a bumpier concept, and anniversary broadcasts are dropping the whole theme into the media streams where RantWoman most often wanders.

The Colorado columbine is a lovely flower. The state flower type has delicate pistils, white rounded petals atop more pointed light blue or purple petals. Other columbines have white or yellow centers with pink or red petals. For a lovely picture and nice state flower blurb, see the
Columbine entry at The Flower Expert . Or see Other Columbine Images and a fun item about Some Columbine legalities

Columbines actually like pretty harsh climates. They bloom early in the spring, but early in the spring in Colorado is about May after sometimes months of snow and subzero weather. One broadcast this morning talked about columbines growing through cracks in granite. In other words, despite it's delicate appearance, the columbine is pretty formidable flora.
Perhaps this is exactly the sort of flower to keep holding onto as the media revisit all of April's quota of maladjusted young men with too much access to firearms and other forces of destruction, brave flowers and sensible, caring adults...