I want to hold on to, to hoard, beautiful things like flowers. I want to pick a figurative bouquet of all the things I love and surround myself with them to keep them close to my heart.
But this type of hoarding goes against my deepest value, that beautiful things are made to be shared because by sharing them, we send even more wonder and love and positive energy into the world. As I write this, hope murmurs in my ear that by sharing pieces of our essential selves, we plant the seeds of inspiration and growth and change for ourselves and others.
As I’ve had to learn so many times over again, there comes a time when even the closest stories to your heart must be released in order to grow, that letting go of flowers is the only way forward. And eight months after spending the winter in California working on it, it’s finally time to send this story into the world.
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She called herself a photographer, a wedding photographer, which was the identity she had wanted so much for herself and the business she built with her own two hands and the support of her village. Even though from the outside it might have looked like she had it made – the magazine covers and wedding features, the busy schedule of shoots and the backlog of editing – inside it didn’t feel like enough. She didn’t feel like enough.
Not being enough felt like shame. Getting what she had strived for and wanted for so long but not feeling appreciative, not feeling happy. Feeling like there was more she could do, but not knowing what to do to find it, being suffocated with anxiety that she could never make everyone else happy (and making everyone else happy was how she thought she was supposed to find her own).
And so she sent out a beacon into the dark, seeking light. It called forth a kindred spirit who gently suggested she weed her garden, metaphorically of course, which was a task she knew how to do because her actual, real life garden also required many weekends of weeding, always during the busiest seasons. And the metaphorical garden was no different – she wasn’t sure what the plan was for this metaphorical garden of her life, only that space needed to be made for some new landscaping and time for appreciating the flowers she grew. Maybe it would be for rest and restoration of her soul, maybe it would be for playing and frolicking with friends and feeling the sun on her skin; the only thing that was certain was that her garden did not need any more flowers of the easy-to-grow busy and people-pleasing varieties.
The weeding process was slow and required something that felt like faith, that the space being cleared would be fertile ground for something new even if an actual winter stood between her and her creative spring. Because after her soil was cleared of weeds, it sat there, bare and ugly for a season, vulnerable to the rains, the winds, the sun…even the seeds of the weeds that were just cleared.
Flowers became not just something she loved and wondered at, but a meditation on what happens to a life that was planted and watered, but then left to grow wild without tender care and intention. As new ideas began to flourish in the space she’d created, she picked them hungrily, holding them up to the light to wonder at them, grasping them tightly in her fist before trying to save their beauty forever by placing them in water, to keep them from leaving her too soon, to keep her from having to let the flowers, her happiness, go. She’d lost beauty and life in the hustle before; how could she let them slip through her fingers again?
For weeks that winter, she gathered flowers, hoarded them. And finally one day, she saw the abundance that she had collected, how much more she had than she could use, and how essential it had become that the beauty, the colors, the delight, and the magic be shared. And so she scooped up all of her flowers into her arms and ventured out into the world to set them free. Some were made into bouquets to share with friends. Others she used to create art that made her smile that she could give away long after the flowers were gone. Some she scattered on the ground to dance upon with strangers. And from those that had shed them, she took their petals and sent them high into the sky and away on the wind as a celebration.
Finally, at the end of the day, as the sun set upon the horizon, she filled a life raft with all that she had left and returned the flowers to the largest body of water she could find, sending them off into the waves of the ocean with gratitude for everything they had taught her, and grateful they led her to create from a place of joy, where fresh flowers now grow abundant.
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Select photos from this shoot are coming to the Cheerful Print Shop soon, hooray! Find out when they arrive by signing up for the newsletter. Always happy to help with custom orders, pairings, sizing, or anything else – just send a note to hello@annareynal.com.
(A huge note of thanks to two of my favorite humans, Kelly Batley for modeling and wardrobe styling and being the perfect person with whom to run around by the ocean taking pictures of flowers, and Alysia Birkholz for frolicking in a field of flowers with me on a sunny afternoon and being a perfect hand model.)
