In Orbit

While waiting for the sweet Peet’s barista to create the predictable amount of foam for the top of my coffee, I peered outside to the sidewalk flower pots and panicked. There, in wide, full bloom, was a twirling array of camellias, spiraling around its own dense branches.  My immediate thought rushed to my own, far less manicured flowers at home…three ancient bushes that offer up their hearty, flowered faces every winter.  It is one of the things I look forward to in the rainy season.  Their twiggy stems sit more comfortable in a bowl than a vase.  Usually around that unrelenting part of the winter, our home has a few bowls of flowers scattered about.  It’s a bit of color during our few, gray days.

So, why the panic?  Perhaps I have been so immersed in my own world of feet and fractures that I missed the blooms!  The plants are not in plain view and require a bit of a muddy trek.   And if the season went by with no colorful bowls, would the world still turn the same way?  I’m not sure and don’t want to test the theory.

So with paper coffee cup in hand, I raced back up the mountain, put on my mud boots (I do own mud boots) and found the camellias.  Just the hot pink ones had begun to peek.  The gentle white and pale pink ones had heaps of closed buds, ready to blossom but not without my attention.  I sighed with relief, plucked a few flowers, and stomped mud through the house while I found some bowls.  The world would still turn.

Why is it that there are certain things we just have to have the same?  And why is that some people, present party included, have a so many of those certain things that it seems to dictate our day, our mood, our Earth’s rotation?  Let’s go back to the coffee shop where the camellia plant was spotted.  It was a Peet’s coffee.  It’s always Peet’s.   And it was right around 10.  It’s always right around 10.  And it was the same coffee order so unique and confusing that the baristas, know me by my latte.  See what I mean?

I am discovering that I am frightfully ritualistic.  I consider these rituals more of my comforts…they create this beautifully, predictable world that helps me take on all the other uncertain things the days may throw my way.  So, it is probably not surprising that I make myself the same breakfast almost every morning….that I drink tea from only three certain mugs…and that I have two worn out sweaters that are my wardrobe fallback.  And these comforts keep my world spinning just right.

One of my daughters cannot eat the same breakfast in one week.  She craves variety in all things and is often found in the kitchen whipping up some kind of omelet or crepe.   I use the same pot…and cook the same oatmeal.  She can mix and match her shirts or shorts with anything.  I am wearing the same Nike pullover…because I own three.  I often wonder how she came from my gene pool.  Or maybe her hemisphere just spins faster.

I read once, probably in one of the three same magazines I have subscribed to for years, that we all have unique comfort levels in regards to change. The key is to find your own and listen to what you need. It is ok to have predictability in our lives…just so long as we know to stay open to the potential of change.   Because some day…Peet’s will be closed, a coffee mug may break, or both my sweaters may be in the wash.  But for now…I have a few bright flowers to keep my world spinning.