Waiting for roses

I only went to the grocery store to get the ingredients for dinner that night. The meat section is way at the back and so the categorized aisles had to be skirted before I could get to frozen chicken. I was focused but suddenly, there before my very eyes, a whole section of chocolates wrapped in red foil, encased in red boxes, shaped and molded as hearts, and yes, roses... all red of them. I was distracted. I was reminded that Valentines season has begun.

This episode was 2 weeks ago, and next week lovers, married or otherwise, and every one (or two) else who comply to this tradition will celebrate Valentines Day, if not, at least to acknowledge it.

My take on Valentines Day is conducive. I like the fact that love subjects people around the world to be appreciative of their beloved. But for a few years now, I really have not been celebrating, or better put, stroked with the representations of Valentines - be it hearts, candy, chocolates, and yes, roses. I reacted to the amiss bequest artlessly. And just as I said, it's all conducive. Conditions and circumstances motivated the absence of this event in my life. Thus, the air of romance pretty much dissipated around my aura.

Transition wise, I have become quite the liberal in terms of connections and coupling with another. My adjustment to this forethought would put me on even keel with my emotional wellbeing. I really didn't want to be heartbroken consistently. Romance was put on hold. Love could not be in the air, at least not in my aura. I became a casual acquaintance, and if there was to be more than a quick connection, I would be a nice woman-friend.

Recently, though this thing we label romance has started pinching me on my side just as my mother used to do to me as a kid when I would be a naughty girl and be up to something. I reacted to this pinch with a sudden twitch, a little ticklish and an inexact wariness. But I also felt the excitement as the beating of my heart palpitated sending signals to different parts of my texture. The butterflies fluttered and my head saw animations. It has become almost delirious! Could it really be happening that I am once again enchanted with this thing called 'love'?

The roses I see are in different colors, some budding, others blooming. The petals are silken, soft and sensitive to the feel of a cheek and the tip of my nose as I lean close to smell the rose's mellow and calming scent. The stems are exfoliated of their thorns to prevent the pricking of my fingers. I carefully bunch them together to preserve their life encasing the roses in my crystal vase of keeping.

Thus, my reveries have returned, and my aura becomes brilliant and lucid once again.

When the night has been too lonely
and the road has been too long
and you think that love is only
for the lucky and the strong
Just remember in the winterfar
beneath the bitter snows
lies the seed that
with the sun's love
in the spring
becomes the rose.
- Betty Midler's, The Rose