Page 1 of Tipping the Scales

I'll never forget the flowers at my mothers funeral. All white and bright, speckled with pink and greenery. They were the only colorful thing against a sea of black. Shiny ribbons draped across them with the labels she wore in life: daughter, wife, mother, friend. The weight of the labels she would never get hanging thick in the air: grandmother, retired, thirty years of happy marriage.

Those same flowers, if arranged differently, could be used to celebrate a marriage. Ironic isn't it? Here, they decorate the close of a life, but they could have been adorning the join of two lives forever. The graveside decorations as a bouquet being carried by the bride down the aisle to her beloved.

Thinking back, that must have been when I became obsessed with them. The beauty in the love and the beauty in the loss. The common thread is life between the two. From that thread, I started Thornes In Bloom, a flower shop boasting the most vibrant colors I can find. Getting lost in my work is almost like a free version of therapy, helping to maintain mysanity. Sometimes extending into the night, not even making it home, only crashing in the back office for a few hours.

I never went to college, the death of my mother throwing me into a spiral. I threw myself into the possibility of this place. A local family offered to collaborate, allowing me to use part of their field for my flower-growing experiments. I never looked back. The process of learning what made each plant happy served as a distraction from my family falling apart.

Each flower needs the same core things - water, sunshine, someone to fluff the dirt around their roots - but they all prefer different increments of those things. Daffodils are perpetually parched, like the morning after a night of too much alcohol. Peonies crave every ounce of sunlight they can get, soaking up the rays and bending their bodies to optimize their solar power.

Keeping track of the flowers kept me busy, mind and body. It was the distraction I needed back then. Now, it's my livelihood. the driving force that pulls me from the sheets each morning.

Bradley and Beth Greenway took me under their wing after their daughter, Bryn, and I became best friends as kids. We first bonded over the quintessential pre-teen topic: Backstreet Boys or *NSYNC. We agreed that Backstreet was superior and our friendship was born. She called dibs on AJ - always a sucker for the bad boys - and Brian was mine, my mind drifting to dreams over his seductive voice and wholesome family man reputation.

Bryn is two years younger than me, but her life growing up on the farm left her sheltered as a kid. Then, once she graduated from high school, she learned how to let out her wild side, spending most weekends at Ellysian Tech nearby, partying with boys and getting tangled in sororitydrama. I envied her a little, wishing that I could abandon all responsibility and become her wingman, finding the fun in all the debauchery she was enjoying. But I was in charge of the flowers, and my father who I was still trying to find the perfect balance of necessities for.

He needed sunlight, but hated going outside. He needed food but refused to eat the meals I learned how to cook from watching the cooking channel. The one thing he did do was shower, most of the time running all the hot water from the pipes and still not getting his hair degreased.

It's a hard balance learning how to take care of someone who is supposed to be the one taking care of you. We lost my mother when I was seventeen, and though I had already gotten my period and had the special birds and bees talk with her, it is never easy for a girl to lose her mom. And only having a brother and a father, no other females in the family, it didn't make things better. I love my brother, Darren, but losing Mom sent him into a bigger spiral than mine, pushing him into the military and getting deployed shortly after. Which brings us back to my father whom I was left in the care of, but realistically he was left in my care.

So instead of living beside Bryn in her freestyle life, I got to listen to every story after the fact, and imagine I had the life she is living. All the guys in this town are the ones I know from high school, and if I didn't like them then, I know I won't like them now. I know too much about them and they know my messy history. I have changed in a lot of ways since then ... and stayed the same in others. I was the cornerstone in so many backwoods parties and old warehouse raves before we lost my mom. My parents were so busy being proud of my big brother that they didn't think they had anything to worry about with me. They were a little wrong.

"Dee, what's your sign? This quiz tellsyou what will happen in your life next month." I doubt a magazine will predict my plan to continue riding the single bus and enjoying every minute of it, but I play along for Bryn's sake.

"Libra," is all I say before she gets busy running her eyes down the page, scanning to find the symbol of even scales.

"Oh, here it is: With the sun now at the top of your chart, where it will stay for the next four weeks, you have an enormous advantage when dealing with others. You'll look good even if you don't do anything special. Someone might oppose you, but be diplomatic and keep smiling. You've got this."

I'm not sure if she added that last part or not, but I appreciate the sentiment. I have a few wedding consultations coming up and hopefully they love where my sun is instead of being the ones who will oppose me. There is one consult that I really want to nail. My brother's new girlfriend, Ella, has a brother who works in the photography business. He recently got engaged to another photographer and being part of their wedding could be a huge push for me. Brett Kane and Carter Vaughn are big influences in that scene from their work on Ovis magazine, which ironically is what Bryn is reading while she sits with me right now. That, combined with the Costa Rican dream wedding I worked last month - where my brother Darren fell head over heels with Ella, the sister I always wanted but never had until now - I am anticipating my wedding calendar for next year to be booked solid before Christmas.

Even with Bryn being in her party girl stage, she still finds time to visit me at the fields when she can. I flash her a smile. She means well, I know she does. And I am thankful that she has taken it upon herself to helpout - without me having to pay her - for the past few years. Because honestly, I can't afford to hire anyone without eating into the miniature profits I have been scrounging aside for the business.

"Wait! This is beyond brilliant. Have you ever seen something like this before?" She holds the magazine out to me, pushing the pages apart so I can see the flowers behind the large title: Flower Arranging Parties The New Paint And Sip.

I take the magazine from her hands, scanning the article and my mind drifts to images of a girls night out event, wine filling glasses and laughter echoing around the space while they try to hone their coordination long enough to stuff flowers into vases. It's something Mom would have loved.

"This could be the opening event you need for the space you have been dragging your feet to open." Bryn's eyebrows practically hit her hairline as she gives me a knowing look. I took out a lease on a nearby storefront but have been procrastinating to take the leap and open it. When I turned eighteen, Dad gave me the money they had been saving for my college education. I was a little shocked they thought I would go to college considering my grades were garbage and I never expressed interest in more school. That money became the nest egg for my business, not the mini project I started as a teen, but the business I picture in my future. I already invested in making it happen, but the idea of opening the doors, of putting a sign above the door that is mine freaks me the hell out.

It's funny because so much of the work has already been done inside, all I would need to do is some local advertising and throw a grand opening bash. This might be the push I need to branch out from my tiny corner at Greenway Farms and into something larger, something more mine.

"Let's do it," I say before I can talk myself out of it. This is what I have been dreaming of and it's time to make it a reality.

"Eeee! I am so excited! I will invite all my friends, of course. We can put up flyers around the farm stand to spread the word. What's the timeline you're thinking? A month?"

In a month, another lease payment will be due. That's too long to keep sitting on my hands waiting for the perfect moment. It has to be sooner, it needs to be before I talk myself out of it. Before I can change my mind about this whole thing.

"Next weekend. It doesn't have to be packed, but that gives me enough time to plan the arrangement and get any extra supplies we may need."

This is happening ...

Another milestone without my mother being here to cheer me on, to tell me she is proud. But I know Darren and Ella will be there for me, that the town will rally behind me as a small business owner and someone who grew up in this community.

There's no point in getting stuck on what is missing. But that never seems to stop my mind from wondering how things would be different if she were still here.

If she was cheering at my graduation.

Snapping nonstop pictures of me and asking to twirl in my prom dress.

Giving me relationship advice as things got more serious.