love | this is lemonade

I haven’t done a Treasure Trove Thursday for a long time. It’s not because there aren’t plenty of treasures in my life. It’s just that I have found the deeper thoughts often escaping me recently – the time and space to sit and reflect and write what I have reflected upon, in such a way that is appropriate – they’ve been scarce lately. But I wanted to share with you this website and talk that I stumbled upon today, and to thank you for your friendship.

We all go through battles we didn’t choose. Photographer Angelo Merendino and his wife Jennifer chose to share their battle with the world through some beautifully simple and honest images. The story of Jennifer’s journey with breast cancer is a very intimate one. Angelo does not make his wife out to be a heroine of pedestal status. I was touched by how theirs was ultimately a simple love story, a story of family and friendship, a story of the need of human beings for each other. Yes, ultimately it is a story of a very personal loss, but also a story that has already been an inspiration to many.

Today is not a day too late, to tell those around you that they matter to you. That you love them. That you need them. That you treasure them.

My first memory of lavender is of walking past a low wall bordering a neighbour’s front garden on the way to school. Lavender was planted along the top of the wall so that it spilled over the side. I fell in love from those early days. Our relationship was unequal however, I admired from a distance. Despite its accessibility even to my shorter self, I soon preferred to cross over on the other side to avoid confronting the large number of bumble bees hovering busily from bud to bud.

My kitchen has been filled with the beautiful heady scent of lavender recently. I inherited a well-tended, mature lavender bush that has bloomed in abundance this season. (I was going to say summer there but I thought I would be kidding myself…) So far I have harvested less than five percent of the stems and it barely shows. I have a lot more work to do, to make sure there will continue to be generous flower yields in future.

One of my best friends once commented that I say “wow!” a lot. Yes I do. It’s the only thing I can muster when I just can’t describe that awe and pleasure derived from something amazing: I just love lavender. Its perfume is wonderfully calming and invigorating at the same time. The colour is intense, with shades of blues, purples, greens and greys. Absolutely gorgeous – I must do a Frivolous Fashion post based on these hues on Friday – watch this space!