You may even add the adjectives “little” and “purple” before the insult.
Or is it an affront at all?
To be sure, when I was a kid and someone called another kid a pansy, it suggested they were weak. A pushover. Cute, but lacking any real mettle.
As an adult, I realize what a misnomer this is. Tending to my little purple pansy a decade ago changed my view of the class and connotation of the word.
My pansy plant was a rescue from a man who had less than a green thumb with her. She was hanging in a basket with less than full sun exposure. Half of her was blooming. The other side was shriveling, so I staged a friendly intervention with a wink and a nod from the homeowner. Off we went to my deck where her future buddies, sage and basil, were blossoming. They welcomed her into the neighborhood.
My little purple pansy plant flourished with full summer sun nourishing her most days and rain bathing her in between. When I harvested basil and sage for pesto in late August, I was grateful for the enduring beauty this floral brought to my balcony. Purple is a buoyant color, and she indeed rose above the paler shades of my condo and the deep greens of the trees alongside my deck. I loved looking at her.
And I was impressed at how she grew even as temperatures fell. One chilly, late-September night, I brought her inside concerned that the drop below freezing would be too much for her. Turns out, she wilted. So, I breathed-in deep, said a little prayer and put her back outside. She was refreshed, even robust, by my second sip of coffee that next morning.
Then, on a Friday, late in January, Mother Nature hurled her first snowballs. My heart still sinks recalling the moment I realized that my little purple pansy was outdoors all alone braving the nasty chill and sleet that was falling fast. She was on my mind all during a client session and on my mind at lunchtime when I dashed up to blanket my elderly horse in his outdoor run-in. My little pansy was on my mind when I opened and adjourned my afternoon meeting — all the time being careful not to reveal to my colleagues my worry that would seem so silly to them in the context of our pressing work. I drove home as fast as slippery roads would allow and ran up the two flights of stairs into my unit and over to the deck.
There she was, alone and covered in snow. I felt awful, even guilty. I knew when I left that morning that I had forgotten something. The forecast was spot-on, but I blew it with my little purple pansy. Do you remember the record-breaking serial blizzards in the winter of 2016 in New England? Like the rest of us, she was buried beneath the Connecticut permafrost.
I closed the deck curtains attempting to put her out of my mind with pseudo-comfort stemming from the notion that pansies are “annuals.” Nice to look at. Good for garnish. Not meant to last. Heck, they’re even edible. Adorn your salad with them and you can “have ’em for lunch.”
I put her out of my head that winter, but not my empty-nester heart. Once the ice started to melt in March and the tippy top of the black handle on her hanging basket came peeking through, my heart skipped a childishly optimistic beat. As the sun and warmer temperatures melted away some snow, I found myself irrationally hopeful that she was in there, alive for the hydration. I looked for her every single day.
But what little creature could have survived Mother Nature’s relentless assaults that winter?
Turns out, my little purple pansy was alive and well! Yep, I stepped out on my deck in late March, eyes wide, breath short. There she was. Greens filled her basket. One little purple bloom, perfectly intact, peeking out.
Ten winters later, I’m still smiling from that unexpected reunion!
The discovery of this cool-weather perennial got me — now a soloist in life — thinking about sister souls who have been through so many seasons and exposed to both harsh and nurturing treatment. Humans and Mother Nature can be cruel, kind and indifferent to us. Sometimes parts of us flourish. Sometimes parts of us wither. Sometimes someone benignly neglects us, or we idle in an environment that can’t facilitate our growth.
But none of those patches define or seal our fate — not if we get our pansy on.
We may be deemed disposable by some. We may appear buried by or to others. But underneath — if we’re true to our nature — we are vital in all weather, cycling towards our next season.
So, please, call me a pansy anytime.
Lisa Bernard is 60-something, encore-career, award-winning writer who explores aging and reinvention, especially for widows and other soloing women. A version of this essay appeared years ago on her blog, www.LisaBernard.WordPress.com, and was delivered at a Writers’ Mic more recently. Its resonance with gals of varying generations occasioned this redux.