This weekend was the biennial Flower Show at the Atlanta Botanical Garden. Since this year is the 50th anniversary of the garden, the theme of the flower show was Heirlooms, and the show featured exceptional creations.  We had been to the show in 2024, so it was fun to go again and see the new creations on exhibit.

The show was divided into four primary types of art – Floral Design, Horticulture, Photography and Botanical Arts. Within each of these divisions were judged competitions, and the awards for First Place, Second Place, and Honorable Mention were displayed next to the entries.

The Floral Design division was probably the most interesting one. Each entry used flowers to create a work of art. The division was divided into six categories – Vintage Illustrations, Chapeaux de l’Epoque, Portraitures, Art on the Grounds, Keepsake China, and Time-Honored Anniversary Gifts.

The Chapeaux de l’Epoque category featured hat styles from different decades.

The Portraitures category featured bouquets that were inspired by portraits of women who made important contributions to the botanical garden over the years. Dorothy Chapman Fuqua and her husband donated the money to build the greenhouse conservatory on the property and provided the foundation for the garden’s orchid center.

Margaret Sheffield Martin was an influential member of the garden’s Board of Directors in the 1980s.

The Art on the Grounds category showcased floral pieces inspired by art objects located around the garden.

The category of Keepsake China showed designs interpreting china or pottery. Each of the entries was displayed in a box.

In the category of Time-Honored Anniversary Gifts, this one represented Silver:

The Horticulture division showcased plants that had been cultivated by home gardeners, and they were divided into two categories – Cut Specimens and Container-Grown Plants. Each subcategory was further divided into a series of classes such as annuals and biennials, perennials, flowering containers, foliage containers. There were a total of 41 classes across the two categories.

Some of the cut flower entries:

One subcategory was Cut Collection in an Heirloom Container:

There was a category called Collection of Three Flowering Geophytes:

The entries weren’t limited to flowers.

The Photography division had some interesting photographs on display. Flowers weren’t required to be included in every entry; it depended on the category in which the photo was entered – Estate Sale, Heirloom Stories, Beauty Never Fades, Whispers of the Past, A Moment in Time, Tools of the Trade, Jubilee, and Moving Forward by Reinterpreting the Past.

Each entry in the Estate Sale category was a composed still life, plant material not required but suggested.

Heirloom Stories featured close-up photographs of heirloom plants.

Whispers of the Past show images of a single bloom in an antique vessel.

A Moment in Time included images of a statue or monument from years past.

Tools of the Trade – photos of garden tools.

Jubilee depicted images of celebration.

Moving Forward by Reinterpreting the Past was very interesting. Each photographer had to take a photo of a bird and then use post-editing techniques to mimic an Audubon print.

The final division was Botanical Arts. In this group, artists created objects with dried flowers, leaves, and seeds in the categories of A Lady’s Ring, A Gentleman’s Pocket Watch, A Child’s Keepsake Box, A Christening Bonnet, A Jack in the Box, and A Cherished Heirloom Seed. I didn’t get any photos of these entries because, quite frankly, I didn’t find them very compelling.

As you can see, with the exception of the Horticulture division, each division had themes of the past, memories, time. The show and its exhibits were a great way to pay tribute to the 50-year history of the Atlanta Botanical Garden.

Today is John Lewis’ birthday. He was born in Pike County, Alabama on February 21, 1940. When he was growing up, his mom told him to stay out of trouble. He took that to heart, and throughout his life, he only got into what he called “good trouble.”

Mr. Lewis was a civil rights activist and one of the heroes of the Civil Rights Movement. He started his activist career while he was a college student in Nashville. His first arrest (of nearly 50 during his life) was at the Woolworths where he and other black students were peacefully waiting to be served at the lunch counter on the mezzanine. During a trip to Nashville in 2018, I visited the old Woolworths. It is now a large restaurant, and I had lunch at the ground-floor lunch counter. I sat right there on the fourth stool and had sweet potato soup.

Mr. Lewis later became close friends with Martin Luther King, Jr. In 1963, He joined Rev. Dr. King for the March on Washington where King delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech. A 23-year-old John Lewis also delivered a speech to the crowd of 200,000.

In 1965, he was one of the participants in a march from Selma, Alabama to Montgomery, Alabama to protest racial discrimination in voting. At the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, the marchers were met with violence by local law enforcement. The police beat Mr. Lewis so badly that they cracked his skull.

In 1961, he became one of the original thirteen Freedom Riders. The group of blacks and whites planned to ride interstate buses from Washington, DC to New Orleans and to challenge laws in the South which mandated segregated seating on buses. In the South, the group was beaten by angry mobs and arrested.

Later, Mr. Lewis formally entered the political world. He was the US Representative for Georgia’s 5th District from 1987 until his death in 2020. Among his other accomplishments, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011.

My neighborhood is in the 5th district, so he was my congressman. During the Inman Park Festival each spring, he would ride in the parade, and his car would be staged next to my house before the event. It was fun to watch people walk up to him and shake his hand as he waited for the parade to start. For all of his fame and accomplishments, he was very down to earth. He was absolutely adored around here. 

Mr. Lewis died July 17, 2020, just four months into the pandemic. He didn’t get to see us emerge on the other side of that terrible time. He didn’t get to see Joe Biden get elected as US president in November 2020. 

When he died, the neighbors put ribbons all over the neighborhood. Some of them were up for months.

As I reflect back on John Lewis’ story, I recognize that he was a humble man who led a remarkable life. And, up until the end, he was getting into good trouble.

Today is the 20^th anniversary of our first date. I thought about writing about the lead-up to the date, how he asked me out, how we decided what to do during our date. In the end, I decided that there are some memories that are nice to keep just for ourselves.

I’ll keep it brief and say that we met on a Saturday afternoon at the Japanese Tea Garden in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. I still remember what I was wearing and how excited I was when I saw him walking towards me in a red, orange, and green striped sweater. He still has that sweater. We spent the afternoon at the de Young Museum, wandering around and getting to know each other. We went for sushi for dinner and then talked late into the night.

Our second date was the following Tuesday, and our third date was two days later on Thursday.

That Saturday, he invited me over to his apartment to cook me dinner. He asked if I liked ravioli, and I thought he was going to open a package of refrigerated pasta from the grocery store. Instead, he scooped some flour onto the kitchen counter, cracked an egg into it, and started mixing. My knees literally got weak and I leaned against the wall and thought, “That is so hot!”

Dinner was delicious, and we spent another fun evening together. Later I thought, “I could get used to this…”

Eight months later, we got engaged.