Honouring Sentimentality Through Floral Arranging: Listening to nature’s call for letting go and holding on
Taylor Bourassa-Wilson, RP, DTATI
Ottawa, ON
Taylor Bourassa is a Registered Psychotherapist and art therapist with a private practice, Wellness Grove Therapy. She incorporates the environment into her practice through the use of natural materials, meditative practices that centre the earth, inviting the natural environment into sessions as a co-facilitator, and sharing the primordial knowledge the earth provides.
Figure 1. Venue Space: Bleeks & Bergamot in Ashton, ON.
“And even after the apple is eaten, its seeds continue to bring abundance. These
seeds, small yet potent, hold the promise of new life and growth. They remind us
that love, once planted, continues to flourish and multiply, creating a legacy of
abundance that extends far beyond the present moment.”
– Vow excerpt, September 2024
At the end of September this year, I had the privilege of getting married and hosting a party surrounded by family, friends, and of course, nature. While planning this wedding we ran into some roadblocks– namely the cost of flowers, which we considered to be a big part of the day, not only for their beauty, fragrance and romantic aspects, but their symbolic nature that helps to illustrate our shared internal world as we transition from one state to the next.
My response to this roadblock was to learn how to create floral arrangements and arches to perfectly curate what we were looking for. It didn’t seem like that big of a task because I had always had it in the back of my mind that I would eventually, one day, open a bookstore/cafe/flower shop and hey, there’s no time like the present, right?
I spent the better part of a year learning the basic art of floral arranging through books, videos and workshops, and I made plenty of practice arrangements. Throughout this entire process I was met with a recurring question over sustainability and the potential impacts on the environment this practice can have. My answer to this question was to focus my own work on dried or preserved flowers and faux flowers. Then came the question of finding ethically sourced flowers and greenery (for all states: dry, preserved and faux). How could I justify engaging with products that might be seen as frivolous by some, and which had the potential for harm if not engaged with properly?
It wasn’t a joke that I would like to open a multi-use third space that included a flower shop, and while practicing these arrangements I came to the conclusion that I could actually do this, eventually. And that even if I never did, I would keep all my faux flowers and re-use them to construct new arrangements seasonally, responding to the beauty of nature around me and bringing it indoors, without the potential for harming a plant in the garden or a squirrel’s home in the process. Each faux flower has thus been de-constructed and organized by type and colour, currently stored for future use.
Figure 2. Faux Flowers prepped for storage
The use of faux flowers really made me explore my relationship to continuity and the idea of “holding on”. I have always been a sentimental person, but when it comes to things like the environment and the need to protect her, that sentimentality takes centre stage. The thing about faux flowers is that they won’t really change over time. They may get dusty if not stored properly, and they may lose some of their shape if squished, or their colour if exposed to the sun too long. But they are malleable, I can clean them off, I can keep them out of the sun (because they don’t need that resource), and I can steam their petals to re-shape them. They are truly the representation of “holding on”: not only do they retain the memory and felt sense of what our wedding day was, they retain their body and soul.¹
What does it mean to hold onto something? Is it always a bad thing? As a sentimental person coming from the 90s, the act of holding on has a firm grasp on me through continued engagement with nostalgia. I re-visit times and places through my memories, photos and media. I walked down the aisle to Sailor Moon’s Sailor Stars Song², so I am very familiar with holding on. There are pieces of me scattered throughout time and space that I don’t want to forget and so I hold on and bring them with me as I journey into the present and future. My faux flowers are doing the same and act as a welcome guide and example for how to do so. When I re-engage with these flowers, yes, they have the memories of that day, but when I place them next to other flowers, or create new arrangements, I am breathing new life into them. They can simultaneously retain their original character, while stretching into the new and unknown.
Figure 3. Faux Head-Table Arrangement
Figure 4. Bridal Bouquet, Photographer: Danielle Aisling
Faux flowers were not the only flowers we used for our wedding. We were lucky enough to find a florist in the city to create a stunning bouquet and boutonnieres, and our venue supplied my bridesmaids with their bouquets. I knew I wanted to somehow preserve my bouquet and have it on display, and I knew that it would not retain the same vitality as it had throughout the day. I picked the bouquet up from the vendor the night before and kept it in the fridge and a vase of water. I fell in love with the bouquet instantly and kept trying to sneak a peek before our wedding and while getting ready the next day. I watched as parts of the bouquet started to slump or lag. About halfway through the day, one anemone was calling it quits: the stalk of the flower was bent almost in half, and it struggled to hold on. It kept looking up at me with its one large eye as if to say, “I’ll keep going for the day, but after that I have to lay down.” It looked tired, yet enthusiastic about what was to come.
I carried that bouquet all night long, holding it to my chest with every ounce of protection geared towards its petals and stalks. The next day when I woke and met the two-day old bouquet in my kitchen, seated in a bucket of water to keep it alive in time to preserve, I saw more of it drooping. I had to work fast, but in the days leading up to the bouquet’s preservation, more and more petals were falling off, especially from the anemones. They are such a delicate flower, and they were quickly succumbing to the pressures of maintaining their façade. I felt myself grow sad as I handed over the bouquet to be preserved and noticed what was left of the anemone: their large eyes staring back at me, trying to tell me they did their best, but they just couldn’t hold on any longer.
When I returned home, I saw their petals scattered on the kitchen table and I felt a sense of pride. I gathered their waxy wings and cradled them in my hand, thanking them for their presence and their role in our day. I thanked them for holding on for as long as they could, took them outside, and let them settle into the grass below. The wind picked them up and scattered them past our yard and into the street. Soon they were far out of sight and far enough away from our home that finding their way back would be near impossible. Now they are with the birds and the squirrels, to help feed or build their homes. They don’t need to hold on any longer because they have a higher purpose now, they get to move on and live a second, third, and fourth life outside of my bouquet.
With that sense of pride in the anemone, I became excited for what was to come. I wanted to see how my preserved bouquet would turn out. It couldn’t be the same as it was the day of our wedding because it was a different day, and only certain parts were holding on. The beauty about preservation is that specific dichotomy between holding on and letting go: the flowers retain some of their vitality, all their memories, and change from what they once were. This change is what begs me to settle and become comfortable with the idea of letting go. Nothing remains the same, and we need to make space for continual growth, change and sometimes death. And then comes the grief and the challenge of holding on to the memories without letting them tie you down. Letting go of what once was to make way for what can now be. Finding the balance between letting go and holding on is a practice in transition. Transitions are liminal spaces and moments in time, which may explain some of their discomfort and uncertainty.
As I reflect on my own practices, I think it is important to note that our wedding itself was a practice in transition, not just from un-wed to wed, from two to one, but seasonally as well. We married on the cusp of the beginning of fall, end of summer, placing us squarely in a position to sit with and question: should I hold on or let go? When it comes to my flowers, it’s a bit of both.
Figure 5. Dried Bridesmaid Bouquet
Figure 6. Preserved Bride Bouquet
Footnotes
[1] Even though they are faux flowers, they are imbued with soul because of the meaning ascribed by myself and my husband, and because they retain a piece of us and our story. The relationship between myself and the faux flower enlivens it with a soul which it carries now, forever.