Flowers And Their Fascination

“She cast her fragrance and her radiance over me. I ought never to have
run away from her… I ought to have guessed all the affection that lay behind her
poor little stratagems. Flowers are so inconsistent! But I was too young to know
how to love her…”

These are the words of Antoine de Saint Exupéry, a French celebrity who is better known across the world as the beloved author of the hit children’s allegorical book, The Little Prince. There is no escaping the fact that flowers truly are and have been since time immemorial the de facto preferred more of expressing feelings of tenderness or affection between members of opposite genders, especially so when the object of said affection belongs to the fairer sex.

A more classy alternative to the status quo virtual electronic message for a loved one who is shifting to say, Mumbai, with pseudo emotions and yellow emojis is to actually send flowers to Mumbai. Why stop at that, now you can also send flowers to Delhi as well as send flowers to Bangalore. This sudden availability of quick, rapid and easy facility of flower delivery is brought to you by the marvels of the digital age, particularly up and coming young and fresh entrepreneurial talent who have intelligently recognised the need for luxury commodities to the rapidly expanding Indian upper middle class bubble.

Some might be under the false impression that displays of affection through bouquets of flowers is reserved solely for young couples or those deeply in love and in committed relationships, however this impression is being repeatedly challenged by the new changes that are being observed in the markets. Not just young couples but also mother and daughters send flowers to Mumbai, and so do multiple families with old relatives living away in special care institutions miles away from their loved ones all alone with only nurses to look after them. In such cases flowers are a wonderful way of reminding someone that they have loved ones who remember them and cherish their fond memories with the individual that they have held since their days of youth, especially as such people are in desperate need of some semblance of companionship and amicability.

In this age of increasing real world distances and smaller and smaller families, flowers make for perhaps the sweetest way to hold family bonds strong across cities, countries, and even possibly continental divides. Flowers can transform an ordinary pasture into a lush, picturesque meadow and an everyday field into a garden filled with soft rustlings and the sweetest scents. Perhaps what made Shakespeare so well loved among people at the Globe Theatre was not just his wit and humour but also his vivid description of the beauty of flowers and their delicate elegance:

“I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,

Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,

Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,

With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine.”