“If you have two loaves of bread, keep one to nourish the body, but sell the other to buy hyacinths for the soul.”
- Herodotus.
A memory . . .
The small hillside leading to the lower yard in our old house was covered with grape hyacinths each spring. One day come spring, I would hear my three boys run up the stairs to the deck and burst into the kitchen, hands behind their backs. I would then know they had noticed the hyacinths were in bloom. They would each hold out a hand and present me with a beautiful bouquet. The stems would be varied in size and sometimes hard to emerge in water, and the bouquet often included a few yellow dandelions added for color.
This was back in the day when my friend and I threw house parties of all kinds, someone would come and set up displays of candles, or maybe bakeware, and one of my friends had a crystal party. The only crystal I owned was a candy dish an aunt had sent me when I got married and I had never used it. But I bought three, tiny, beautiful crystal vases at that party in anticipation of the beautiful bouquets my sons would bring to me throughout their childhoods. I still have two of those vases and they have served me well over the years.
Today I have no idea where that candy dish is.