Peonies are my favorite flower. I love how they’re wild but also elegant — the two things I most want to be and secretly (or not so secretly) hope I already am.
Well, as it happens, it’s peony season, which is a bit like hunting season but without the blood.
On Memorial Day, while shopping for a potluck barbecue, I saw a tub of the most gorgeous peonies standing just outside the market day. Afraid they’d wilt in the car — and afraid that someone would nab them if we brought them in — we (or, rather, I) resolved to swing back after our cookout and pick some up. When we got back there, all that were left were the dregs. Should have bagged those bouquets when I had the chance (and dared anyone at that cookout to try to take them home).
A few days later, I went hunting for peonies again, at my usual bargain spots, and no cigar. So I bit the bullet and bought two lush, luscious, getting a beauty contact high just thinking about it bouquets of fuschia and ivory peonies at the anything but bargain Whole Foods (a.k.a. “whole paycheck,” as an actress-comedienne acquaintance of mine taught me to say). “They only come out once a year!,” I reasoned “Who cares about the cost!” And so now there are bouquets of peonies scattered about the house, like the one above on our dresser where they share pride of pace with our picture-less picture frames. (Note to self: order those prints!)
Sometimes it’s the little things. For me, peonies are high on the list of little things that can make my day. They’re right up there with lilacs, which I also cherish for their scarcity and beauty both.
Scarcity, in the end, is what makes the little things mean so much, for scarce are the moments when we slow down enough and get present enough to really appreciate the little things that, in microscopic ways, revolutionize our lives.
What are the little things that make your life? Leave us a comment below and let us know!
PHOTOGRAPHS via (top to bottom) Pinterest, Apartment 34, Diary of The Coveteur and Savvy Home
