The Hydrangea and a Bottle of Single Malt

After covid-19 changed our lives and there was no entertaining happening in our homes, my coffee table slowly got converted into what my friend, Priya, refers to as a 'botanical table'. From having no plants on it to pretty much being covered by them, I felt it added a lot of character to my living room and every time some masked person did come over, they always described it with a complimentary adjective.

The botanical coffee table

Recently for my birthday, the same friend Priya sent me a beautiful hydrangea arrangement that I’m sure cost her a pretty penny. When I was returning from lunch that included several beers, with my friend Anand, it was waiting for me at the building security desk. Anand, the ever practical man immediately made a comment about how money spent on flowers was such a waste and they should just give you the cash instead.  I chose not to say anything in response and just smiled as I picked up my beautiful gift. 

A couple of days prior to this day, I had rearranged my coffee table a little. There was a large glass bowl that I owned when I lived in Chicago, that I ended up bringing back with me to Bangalore. The only time this bowl was used was when I had an annual party where I invited most people that I knew. The last time I had one of these parties, the guest list went up to more than fifty and this really beautiful bowl was used to serve punch. 

Since then, the bowl had been sitting on top of one of my kitchen cabinets, collecting dust. Recently I got on a ‘home lightening’ spree, where I was going through every storage space in my apartment from the largest to the smallest and discarding things that I was no longer using. While there was no noticeable difference in how the apartment looked, each time I emptied something out, I felt a little lighter on the inside. 

The bowl was brought down from above the cabinet and I carefully washed it, having forgotten how incredibly beautiful it was. I felt that having been ignored for such a long time, it now deserved a prominent place in my home and what better spot than the botanical coffee table. A few days later when Priya’s hydrangea arrived, I placed it inside the punch bowl. It was almost as if I had been preparing a spot for these flowers. For the next 2 weeks this arrangement brought me a little extra happiness. The flowers would eventually die and the money spent on it would be considered by some as a waste but would I have wanted some ‘thing’ instead that would take up space, be forgotten and eventually discarded? 

The bowl and the hydangea

I’ve never believed in being overly practical ever in my life. Which is why frequent travel has always been so important to me (I was up to 8 trips in a year when we got hit by the pandemic). The money I spend on travel obviously doesn’t give me any kind of physical return. A practical person would instead take one holiday in a year and invest the rest of the money in something that would keep growing the amount with time. If I did that, I would sit at home and die a slow death counting how much I had made each month disinterestedly (I know I’m being a little dramatic but you get the gist).

Forget that - I’m packing my bags to have some new experiences, to create some new memories, meet new people, see new places, soak in the beauty of nature etc etc, while my bank balance becomes a little bit smaller and my life becomes a little bit richer! Damn you covid-19 for slowing down my plans!

Each one of us has to live our lives the way we think is right for us. I understand that a lot of our obsession for money and the need to invest all of it in property, gold, stocks comes from different reasons such as insecurities of a difficult past, keeping up with your peers etc. It’s a shame though if we don’t use a portion of it and spend it on intangible ‘things’ that keep adding to our memory bank of joys. For all you overly practical folks, be impulsive more often. You might discover that spending money on experiences brings happiness in all kinds of ways. 

The hydrangea is long gone but I still have the vase. Anand, who made the comment about the flowers, got me an expensive bottle of single malt as a birthday gift which will also be gone soon. So I guess I was wrong about Anand being extra practical. I got lucky with both gifts. One was a feast to the eyes and the other is a feast to my senses. Let’s just say ‘cheers’ to that.

P.S. Did anyone notice that I got a new rug between the time the two photos were taken?