John The Flower Guy
An unlikely advocate.
John arrives a few minutes late for his appointment, one of his clients is on speaker phone. He quietly hands me warm peaches he just picked from his tree in the summer sun. I quietly reassure him that I’m not in a hurry, take your time. I can tell this is an important conversation and I am quickly drawn in to the story unfolding as he talks. His grin is twinkling in his eyes.
His client on the phone is an older woman, she is thanking him for the flowers he delivered to her sick friend earlier in the day. “She has been so isolated and hasn’t been able to talk since the stroke, but she was able to say ‘beautiful!’ to her husband. Her favorite was the big yellow lily, she hasn’t stopped smiling.”
John says, “Yes, I chose that one just for her, I knew she would like it”. I am amazed, I know this about John, I know he does that. He understands people and uses his flowers to reach into their lives, during their times of joy or struggle. Think about it, you order flowers for a funeral and you talk to a Flower Guy who really cares about you and what you are going through, who that person was and how this is altering your life. He cares about the person you lost and their family, who they were, who you are, and how this loss has impacted you. He listens to you, encourages you, talks to you about the meaning of life, and then he chooses just the right flowers for you and your situation. Like the time he picked a dozen white roses for a new nurse to give to an old nurse who had mentored him into the profession. As a nurse, that one left me speechless, but I tried to explain that I couldn’t have picked a better symbol of honor and a passing of the torch.
John is there for me to take care of him that day, but I strangely feel like the one who has been touched and blessed. He talks to me about peace and has taught me not to look at life as a war, “John, you really rained on my war vibe”, we laugh. Those of us in caregiving professions know this about our work: sometimes it happens this way. Sometimes this is why we stay.