Being in the right place.

I used to steal flowers. There have been times when I have kept a small pair of scissors in my handbag to facilitate a quick snip as I strolled nonchalantly by.

In my defence I never stole prize blooms from tidy gardens, but I could not resist the sprawling rose from the over grown garden; the unappreciated lilac from the building plot; the perfumed  mock orange flowers from the municipal bush; the lavender spike to crush between the passing fingers.

My criminal days are over. After so many years of waiting I have my own garden and I have loaded it with flowers. When I pass other gardens, I admire and walk on, as my hunger for the beauty of flowers has been satisfied .

I rarely pick my own flowers as I know they will last longer in the garden. Now a days I pick flowers as gifts for neighbours and friends or to save a particular beauty from a threatened hail storm.

These flowers were all picked because they were in the wrong place. The everlasting peas had climbed into my neighbour’s apple tree; the Russian sage was sprawling over the lawn; the artemisia was lying over the gladioli; the marigolds were crowding out my new irises; the phlox had fallen over in the rain and the geranium had been broken by a cat.

I don’t have the flower arranging eyes of the clever bloggers who fill vases on a Monday. These were just crammed in a pot; but none of them were stolen and for now they are in just the  right place!