One Word Challenge, Part Six: "Gardenia"
Today's word, "Gardenia", is brought to you (and to me) by one of my Facebook friends who has known me since kindergarten (minus the years/age 6 through 10, as my family moved around the country, only to return to the same elementary school/city when I was in 5th grade). Ya know the people you grow up with and that all the way through youth you know they will be a kick ass person their entire life? Well, if there is one cool thing about Facebook its that you get a chance to have such confidences in your friends confirmed.
Like so many of the words I've received for this challenge, "Gardenia" is tough because it's not even a word I'd use in regular conversation. Even the previous word I took on, 'Spatula', gets used once in a while. "Kel, could you pass me that spatula?" or, more likely, "Gavin put the spatula on the bottom of the dishwasher and the plastic flat end of it melted!" So "Gardenia" presents a challenge, especially for a not-so-flowers, oh-look-we-have-a-garden-I-didn't-help-with person such as myself.
Here is what the ever handy dictionary.com has to say about this word:
1. any evergreen tree or shrub belonging to the genus Gardenia, of the madder family, native to the warmer parts of the Eastern Hemisphere, cultivated for its usually large, fragrant white flowers.
2. the flower of any of these plants.
Now here is what I did with it:
"Gardenia"
I was expected to be more than this. I was supposed to come from these well-maintained roots of the most ideal environment you can imagine and to blossom into something more captivating than all that came before me and all that surrounds me.
But I haven't.
I've grown healthy and I've been looked over and been told there is nothing wrong here. No one made a mistake in the cultivation or the care or the treatment. But still something didn't go according to plan. All that came up around me was bolder and taller, so impressive to every witness, every eye that paid attention.
I stayed too low to the ground. I was too interested in what was at my feet, afraid that if ever got too far away from that I'd break loose and not be able to stay in a comfortable place or return to it should I wander. If you look down at the earth long enough instead of up to the sky you're bound to wind up shorter than the rest. Your foundation stays solid but you don't stand out.
I gather more dirt than the others. Where I stand it's tough to avoid it. But sometimes, not all the time but enough for sure, I kind of like it. There's less pressure, less a sense of "See what I am! Pick me! Pick me!" At least for all my imperfections I can find comfort in knowing that whatever hand should reach to me someday will be part of something with an alternate view of where to find beauty.
But I am not beautiful.
Its so easy to forget that because there are days when I think somehow I pulled it off; that I somehow, despite all the mistakes I made in looking down or the pure bad luck that came from finding myself in the middle of everything more lush and well-designed, I still came out good. The intention was to be great and I know that. And I failed. But then I think it might be alright to be good or very, very good. I don't have to be the most beautiful thing.
Such ridiculous notions, and they really are that, stay with me and don't get washed away as often as I'd hope or that all those around me would hope. When the rain comes to clean us all I'm still shorter and the dirt cast off from others so often turns to a fine liquid mud and drips down to me, before drying into my limbs and resettling. I lose my imperfections for a moment before someone else's blemishes trickle their way down.
So I think for today I'm going to try and accept it for what it is. I'm not the stand out. I'm not the one who gets selected. But maybe, and I doubt it's true but I suppose it's possible, someone further down in the earth, beyond where I can see ,looks up and sees me absorbing all the rain and collecting all the falling dust and soil and loves me just a little for keeping them safe and dry.
----
I only have ONE WORD left in my bank of words so I really, really need someone to give me something or I'm going to run out. I'm like a literary/creative junkie looking at his stash (which is now down to the word "Shine") and thinking prostition and begging is next! :)
Feed me a word and, if you want one, ask for a word.
Thanks for reading!
J
Like so many of the words I've received for this challenge, "Gardenia" is tough because it's not even a word I'd use in regular conversation. Even the previous word I took on, 'Spatula', gets used once in a while. "Kel, could you pass me that spatula?" or, more likely, "Gavin put the spatula on the bottom of the dishwasher and the plastic flat end of it melted!" So "Gardenia" presents a challenge, especially for a not-so-flowers, oh-look-we-have-a-garden-I-didn't-help-with person such as myself.
Here is what the ever handy dictionary.com has to say about this word:
1. any evergreen tree or shrub belonging to the genus Gardenia, of the madder family, native to the warmer parts of the Eastern Hemisphere, cultivated for its usually large, fragrant white flowers.
2. the flower of any of these plants.
Now here is what I did with it:
"Gardenia"
I was expected to be more than this. I was supposed to come from these well-maintained roots of the most ideal environment you can imagine and to blossom into something more captivating than all that came before me and all that surrounds me.
But I haven't.
I've grown healthy and I've been looked over and been told there is nothing wrong here. No one made a mistake in the cultivation or the care or the treatment. But still something didn't go according to plan. All that came up around me was bolder and taller, so impressive to every witness, every eye that paid attention.
I stayed too low to the ground. I was too interested in what was at my feet, afraid that if ever got too far away from that I'd break loose and not be able to stay in a comfortable place or return to it should I wander. If you look down at the earth long enough instead of up to the sky you're bound to wind up shorter than the rest. Your foundation stays solid but you don't stand out.
I gather more dirt than the others. Where I stand it's tough to avoid it. But sometimes, not all the time but enough for sure, I kind of like it. There's less pressure, less a sense of "See what I am! Pick me! Pick me!" At least for all my imperfections I can find comfort in knowing that whatever hand should reach to me someday will be part of something with an alternate view of where to find beauty.
But I am not beautiful.
Its so easy to forget that because there are days when I think somehow I pulled it off; that I somehow, despite all the mistakes I made in looking down or the pure bad luck that came from finding myself in the middle of everything more lush and well-designed, I still came out good. The intention was to be great and I know that. And I failed. But then I think it might be alright to be good or very, very good. I don't have to be the most beautiful thing.
Such ridiculous notions, and they really are that, stay with me and don't get washed away as often as I'd hope or that all those around me would hope. When the rain comes to clean us all I'm still shorter and the dirt cast off from others so often turns to a fine liquid mud and drips down to me, before drying into my limbs and resettling. I lose my imperfections for a moment before someone else's blemishes trickle their way down.
So I think for today I'm going to try and accept it for what it is. I'm not the stand out. I'm not the one who gets selected. But maybe, and I doubt it's true but I suppose it's possible, someone further down in the earth, beyond where I can see ,looks up and sees me absorbing all the rain and collecting all the falling dust and soil and loves me just a little for keeping them safe and dry.
----
I only have ONE WORD left in my bank of words so I really, really need someone to give me something or I'm going to run out. I'm like a literary/creative junkie looking at his stash (which is now down to the word "Shine") and thinking prostition and begging is next! :)
Feed me a word and, if you want one, ask for a word.
Thanks for reading!
J