Romantic

By Mae Wright

It's a Tuesday evening and my friend B and I are enjoying a beer after work. We're doing what we often do: making up back stories about the city workers walking past on their way home.

It's nearly 5pm and the streets are starting to crowd, so we finds lots of inspiration in the jostling pedestrians. Eventually B says, "Why are so many people carrying flowers?"

"Because it's Valentine's Day; didn't you remember? Ooh, you'll be in trouble when you get home!"

He shrugs, "Nah, I would never get flowers just because it's Valentine's Day. We never used to do that in Australia. I don't know why we started. I think Lee minds a bit, but I find it annoying to be told I have to buy them."

I exclaim in recognition, "Oh, that's what my partner thinks! He says he refuses to go along with (I assume his tone of voice) a stupid American tradition aimed at increasing consumption through guilt. He says it's not romantic to give someone flowers just because it's 'decreed' that you buy flowers (I do the inverted commas with my fingers). He says romantic gestures come from your genuine feelings not from some person called Valentine. I'm fine with that; I still like getting flowers, but not guilt-induced consumerism!!"

We laugh at the irony of capitalism commodifying romance.

Then we turn back to the passing stream of people and pay more attention to flowers in their arms. 

The bouquets comes in all types: single roses, bunches of cheerful blooms, small arrangements in expensive boxing, sweet posies in brown paper tied with string, over the top flamboyant arrangements, large cumbersome bunches of native flowers, artful but awkward to carry ikebana creations. The burdens impact on the speed and gait of the walkers, hunching to avoid damage to their precious load in the chaotic crush of pedestrians; hoping to get home with their flowers intact. Maybe thinking about what other romantic activity the evening might entail.

"Why are flowers considered romantic anyway?" B ponders, watching the passing colour and movement. "And who was Valentine?"

While B gets the next round, I do the research on my phone. The story goes that Valentine was a young priest who lived in the third century AD. Against a law decreed by Emperor Claudius II, Valentine continued to secretly marry soldiers in the Roman army. When Claudius eventually found out, he had Valentine hanged on 14 February, 270. (The specific date is a nice touch to the story; can't verify it though.) Because of his martyrdom, Valentine was later declared a saint by the early Catholic church. He became the patron saint of lovers, epileptics and beekeepers.

The beers are back, so I relate my findings. B and I speculate on the fact that romantic love can take you over like a seizure and it definitely can sting, so those three could plausibly all be looked after by one saint. Valentine's patronage doesn't seem to extend to flowers though.

More research reveals that the tradition of giving flowers for Valentine's Day doesn't start until the 18th century, as part of the practice of using bouquets of flowers to send messages. In this elaborate floral language, introduced by Charles II of Sweden, each flower had a specific meaning. Red roses said, 'I love you'. Combine a bouquet of roses with ivy and you could communicate marriage, fidelity and affection.

We've lost the full language of flowers, but we've kept Valentine's Day and giving flowers to show love and affection. And red roses to symbolise love, it seems.

B wonders which particular flower might say, 'Your business brief needs to be rewritten.' I suggest a bunch of different coloured Ranunculus maybe. Then he wonders if he could find some flowers for his boss that said, 'I actually really don't like working with you.'  I suggest maybe Lobelia in a plastic pot, tied with a droopy bow of red legal tape.

We return our musing to the street full of people and flowers outside the bar.

As outsiders to the Valentine's Day world, we ponder the motivations of different people and what they are saying with their floral gift: love, guilt, obligation, fear, assumptions about gender roles. "Look," says B, "I reckon that guy is having an office affair so he's buying his wife an overly expensive bunch of flowers to make up for his guilt."

We make up back stories about the man nervously protecting his burden of 20 long stemmed roses against his body, the man carrying a bunch of blooms upside down without regard to the heads battering against his legs, the woman carrying a stunning purple orchid in a large flat ceramic pot. I say, "That woman there is really cranky at having to carry an unwieldy container home when she's wearing a cream linen suit and stilettos. She's thinking to herself, 'Why not a single stemmed rose, Bruce?'" B says, "Yeah, she like orchids because they don't smell or make a mess; she's into demonstrations of love but she's really not that romantic."

We wonder if those who are not carrying flowers reject the American tradition too, left it till after the shops ran out, or whether they have forgotten and an unhappy evening awaits them. Maybe it's not something they care about at all. Or maybe they are single, heading for a night alone and bothered by the blooms of other people's romance all around. "That woman in the blue", says B, "She's the only one at her work who didn't get flowers and she's feeling like she's left on the shelf." I say, "Or maybe she's just allergic; she's got those slightly red eyes." "Could be from crying," counters B. I feel a bit sad for her till she passes.

We speculate about whether the size and type of flower bunch is influenced by the duration of the relationship between the 'flowerer' and the 'floweree'. I point out one fellow carrying half a dozen pink rosebuds and say, "That guy has had a new girlfriend for only two weeks and he has spent all afternoon sweating over getting the balance right. He wanted something expensive enough to say he's very keen but not so big that it looks too demanding." B thinks he's got it right.

The flowers parade continues. We talk on, entertaining ourselves with fabrications about other people's romantic lives. The peak hour crush eases, we finish our beers, then head home to our flowerless houses.

That evening, I turn our discussion of romance and flowers into a graph.  A romantic graph.

Romantic (adjective): relating to love or to sexual relationships.

(From Google's dictionary search)