I stood in the sun, sweltering in heat and responsibility.
My flowing white dress, the one I had picked out at Old Navy, the one my mom called “on sale” and I called the beginning of my career as a princess, now felt like a wool coat in the heat of the May afternoon.
My shoulders sagged as the ceremony dragged on and on. I stood in front of the gazebo, a small white structure decked out in tiger lilies, that was blissfully shading the bride and groom but, with no awning on the roof, it left my dark hair baking in the sun.
I held the tiny bird’s nest in my hand, staring down at the coiled purple ribbon and the two rings bouncing the glittering sunlight back into my eyes. I admired the thin, golden ring with the sparkly jewel—the ring I longed to try on, even though I knew that it would only fit my thumb—right next to the thick dark silver-black unadorned ring. I wondered why one was pretty and the other was not.
Finally, when my short legs became exhausted from standing in the same place, I stumbled over to my mom, sinking onto her lap. I felt secure knowing that I could embrace a grow up responsibility of ring-bearer, and also have the comfort and assurance of Mommy right there waiting for me in the front row of seats.
A mother’s love had always been there for me, but now I recognized that it would still be there even when I was grown up enough to hold rings in a tiny nest, or maybe even bigger things.
Finally, when even the adults were starting to become thoroughly impatient with the droning ceremony, the officiant, my grandfather, called for the ring-bearer to come forward with the “most important part of the ceremony.” My heart swelled with pride and I wished the three steps into the gazebo were a thousand.
I especially hoped that my cousin, who had suffered the sun next to me, felt her lowly position as flower girl prick her. After all, hadn’t I gotten to choose whether to be ring bearer or flower girl because of my fourteen months’ seniority?
At last, after a ceremony that lasted a year, I tugged my mom down the small grassy hill toward the pavilion where the food was spread out on rows of picnic tables. My mind had been roving through the delicacies all during the long sermon.
After dinner, and pictures, and toasts, and formalities, they finally wheeled out the most beautiful cake I had ever seen. It was three tiers high, frosted and covered in pearls, lined with tiger lilies. I thought it was absurd to put flowers on a cake, but my childish disgust turned to awe and amazement when my mom explained that they were sugar flowers.
I was flabbergasted, and found a new respect for my aunt Missi, the one who could chop apples at lighting speed and could make the best cookies, and who I was told had made the tiger lilies, complete with orange sugar perfectly simulating the pollen that my mom was so allergic to. I wondered if she would be allergic to the sugar flowers, and thought it best that she not eat them.
After the cake was served out in slices I thought far too small for the occasion, people slowly filtered out into the center of the cold and deliciously smooth concrete floor of the pavilion. They started to dance together, but my mom told me it was fine to dance by myself.
I whirled around the enclosure, swooping close to certain people thinking that they would feel special if the princess paid particular attention to them. I took my shoes off and mopped the concrete with my white tights as I skated around in sock feet feeling free and beautiful.
Eventually though I slackened. All the people around me were in pairs. They were laughing and talking as they slow danced around the floor. Suddenly I wanted another person.
I had heard the term “boyfriend,” but I had never thought of having one. I only heard of them being bad. I had heard of various boyfriends breaking my aunts’ hearts. I saw teenage girls in the park with boyfriends, but the boys were annoying and loud, and the girls seemed desperate. I saw people in Disney movies fall in love. I saw my parents love each other.
But I never thought of this for me. Until I looked around, and my five-year-old self desperately wanted someone to dance with. This was my first real thought of romantic love. My first thought of someone to dance with. My first thought of lacking something because I didn’t have that. It was foreign and lonely.
Tiger lilies are beautiful, but they will be more beautiful when I am not single.
Flash forward a year or two, and I sat in the kitchen chatting with my mom.
I was pondering a movie clip I had overheard. I don’t remember the movie; I only remember that my parents thought I was asleep when they watched it, and that a dad was angrily reprimanding his teenage daughter for having sex with her boyfriend. I had never heard of this thing before but, in my mind, it was a terrible thing, a short hard syllable like crap or other words I couldn’t say. It was something that teen girls liked, and dads didn’t. That sounds pretty hilarious from today’s perspective, but it was real then.
I finally got up the nerve to ask my mom. She explained that it is a cozy thing that people do when they are married and that it is how people can have babies. Good enough. But then I recalled my aunt, whose baby bump had been noticeable as she walked down the aisle.
As my mom tried to explain, the tiger lilies swam into my view. Fleshing out her initially simplistic answer with some of the nuances of adult relationships, my mom teetered on a tightrope—supporting my aunt and uncle while at the same time trying to share her own beliefs about appropriate boundaries for sex.
Suddenly the flowers felt dirty, obscene. I didn’t even know why I felt so unhappy all of the sudden. It was the first time I had heard that someone loving someone else might not always be entirely a good, cozy, beautiful thing. For some reason I revolted against this idea, hated it.
A few years later, and I was ten. I was living with my mom, and my dad was living in a one-room apartment across town while he worked to get sober.
My mom and I had found a tiny house in Versailles, Kentucky. It needed some work. The yard was full of mosquitos, and the front door didn’t open.
One afternoon in early summer, when shorts were finally becoming a necessity instead of wishful thinking, my mom and I were strolling out of our house for a walk around our block. We liked to giggle and cringe at the neighbors who left their Halloween decorations up till Christmas and Christmas decorations up till Halloween. We liked to chat and catch up after school and work and maybe end up at the park that was a few minutes away from our house.
On this day we decided to take a different route, and as we were walking by the front of our house my mom excitedly gestured toward the tiny patch of grass next to our walkway, bordered by monkey grass.
There, growing up right next to the yellow wall, was a cluster of vibrant orange-red tiger lilies. Two were in full bloom; one was still an elongated bud showing sunset-orange through its green casing like a monarch about to escape its chrysalis.
“Oh!” I said. “One for each—me, you, and Daddy!”
“Yes.” She almost whispered. “Those two are us. The bud is Daddy. I don’t think he has bloomed yet.”
My mind crawled into his cluttered, dim apartment across town. I thought of his drunk, bloodshot eyes. I thought of our broken date nights, self-loathing hanging in the air like an uncomfortable warm drizzle on a humid afternoon. I thought of the many reasons we were attending separate churches and living separate lives so that my mom and I could begin breaking free of these cycles.
And this was when I felt, really felt, unconditional love. Love that cared but didn’t let alone. Love that hurt but didn’t break. And in that moment, as we kept walking, I knew that this was the best kind of love. A love that could bloom in any relationship, if you remember that just because you aren’t growing, doesn’t mean you have wilted. It might just mean that you haven’t bloomed yet.
And that is the tiger lily to me. The messy kind of love.
Gaeligh Brown
has adored writing anything from reports to poetry for as long as she can remember. She trains for American Ninja Warrior at her amazing gym Ninja Intensity alongside her team and wonderful coaches, also known as her second family. Her perfect day would include sitting by a window on a rainy Virginia day, reading Lord of the Rings, and eating something that includes chocolate. She lives with her mom (her best friend and spectacular complimentary editor), her dad (a genius who shares her insane sense of humor), and her brother (who, although somewhat whiny, is a daily inspiration and treasure).
2 Responses
Love you Gaeligh! Glad you got to be a princess. =D I only wish I had danced with you because I don’t remember that I did…
Tiger lilies remain my favorite. The messy kind of love is the best anyway so it is fun that that is their meaning for you!
For me, they became my favorite because the two huge bunches by mom and dad’s porch always bloomed in time for the 4th of July parties, pool days and summer sun which are essentials to my favorite time of year.
Well written!
Well done! So proud of you and your whole family as you are growing into a bouquet of fragrant flowers, each unique, each priceless, each created for a glorious purpose!!