I keep looking at the roses on my desk. Yellow and red, my favorite type of rose. Dying. And all the while, I got Nick Cave and Kylie Minogue in my head. I like Nick Cave. He seems like a bit of a psycho, but a very well-spoken, well-read one. The best kind.
She lay on the bank, the wind light as a thief
And I kissed her goodbye, said, "All beauty must die."
And I leant down and planted a rose 'tween her teeth.
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Roses seem to be the only flowers that look good while dying. Most flowers just brown and wilt, but not roses. Little bud of tragedy and grace.
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My head's not where it should be. Maybe it's the heat. Maybe it's the reminder that everything must die, beautiful or otherwise. I've been reading a book by Irvin Yalom, an American psychiatrist, dealing a lot with death. Called "Creatures of a Day" in English, except the person recommending it recommended it to me in Romanian, where it's called something wonderful like "The Ephemerals". All that passes.
It's actually a very touching read, quite light and summery, as it examines encounters with various patients. Yet for once, in such a book, I found the therapist's story to be more entertaining and moving than those of his patients. Most of the stories in the book take place when Yalom was in his early 80s, and deeply aware of his mortality. In fact, several of his patients are in their latter years, which forces the doctor to examine his own impending fear of death. There's one, though, a businessman in his 30s I think, with whom the therapist becomes quite close, and who is dealing with the death of an associate and mentor (a few decades older than him).
As the doctor-patient bond deepens, the businessman becomes worried about losing Dr. Yalom also, a loss he fears he might not be able to deal with. As a reader, I found it moving, though for Yalom, it served as an unpleasant, unwelcome reminder of his own mortality.
The clock ticks for everyone.
The book takes its title from a Marcus Aurelius quote,
All of us are creatures of a day; the rememberer and the remembered alike. All is ephemeral - both memory and the object of memory. The time is at hand when you will have forgotten everything; and the time is at hand when all will have forgotten you. Always reflect that soon you will be no one, and nowhere.
I found it very moving, especially the last sentence. No one and nowhere.It's paralysing and freeing at the same time. In the same phrase, a reminder that life is worth enjoying, for it is but brief, but also that whatever torment you're enduring is transitory.
Oddly, Nick Cave's "Where the Wild Roses Grow" gives me the same feeling. It's depressing, yes, but it's also deeply liberating. One day you'll walk down to the river, and it'll be so simple.
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Phew. Who woulda thought that was brewing in my mind. I just set out to take some rose pictures, since I couldn't focus on work. I certainly didn't intend on rambling. But there you are. How's your Sunday going?
...Almost forgot. How else to end this?
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Thank you so much!!
"Vanitas" - also a very nice word for the same thing:)
Liberating and depressing indeed, I enjoyed the read (and the roses)!
I didn't know that type of art had a specific name. Thank you! <3 Hope your travels are going well.
Nick Cave certainly has seen his share of tragedy. Two sons lost in seven years. I can't imagine.
That last rose picture is terrifying. Maybe it's just my perverted mind but it seems a riff on the old vagina dentata nightmare...
We've had an oddly optimistic year here. Last year at this time my mother was in the hospital suffering from infections and seizures, unable to talk and unwilling to eat. All the doctors were saying there's not much we can do, make sure her paperwork is in order. But it was amazing how she started to recover once they took her off the medications that were supposed to make her better. Eventually she was able to get out of bed. She had to use a walker or a cane for a while, but stubbornly refused to when no one was looking. Last week she mowed the lawn by herself!
So all beauty must die, sure, but we don't have to rush it along. Sometimes it'll surprise us by sticking around. (And after all, these lovely minutes will always exist, in the past.)
I think I only knew about one son. Poor man.
Well, an equally perverted mind just Googled it, even though she understood what it meant, so there xD I thought of that too, honestly. Kinda thought of the flower/mother in Pink Floyd's The Wall.
Your mother is astonishing. She definitely seems to have that force of life in her, that special energy. I'm really glad she turned around (because I do think in many of these situations, who you are and what drives you plays an important role in recovery). So, I'm so so happy for all of you <3
Otherwise, you are well, I hope? Missing your images and words around here.
What a lovely way to describe it. Yes. There's something exhilarating about kicking death in the ass.
Nice photos and this post has so many dimensions to it.
This line popped out at me too.🤗