Diary of a gardener - An Anthophile

According to the Oxford dictionary: “An anthophile is a person who loves flowers. The term comes from the Greek words anthos, meaning flower, and phile comes from Greek meaning ‘love’.”

I claim my ‘anthophile’ badge proudly. As someone who loves flowers, I had no idea there was a word to explain this disorder I felt I had. Is it the colors, textures, growth patterns or smells that mesmerize me into a trance that I cannot stop until each flower has been inspected? As I meander around the pathways of my garden inspecting each flower one by one, I must look like an animal scavenging for food. Couple that with my phone in my hand as I take photos of each flower and often the butterflies that I watch as they flit around from petal to petal. The flowers flow in the wind, sometimes a bee in its center feeding on its pollen. Inspection of the double blooms, their mixed hues of pinks and contrasting colors. It has speckled flowers or stripes. Some clump together, others are on a single stem. Some tall, others short, some just in-between. They create a landscape of vignettes, one reaching out to touch the other and unsure where one flower begins and the other ends.

Certain flowers are tired, they are missing petals, limp and dry, others have just emerged from their infant bud stage. Those are bright, cheerful, and soaking up the sunshine. The question is do I cut the flower and bring it inside to sit on my kitchen table or do I leave the flowers for myself and other possible anthophiles to view from the sidewalk? Leaving for others to see always wins. But mostly for myself to keep going outside to inspect and fall into a trance over and over, flirting with each plant, chatting with it, and thanking it for the beauty it bestows on me.

Are you an anthophile? I feel like you are, or you would not be here reading my weekly musing in the garden. If you are not that is okay too.

Remember to always keep growing.