![]() ![]() The second night we dined at the Inn, which was a special treat. We were accompanied by friends on that trip who had not really experienced Virginia wine country, and we were not disappointed - dinner the first night at Palladio, followed by visits the next day to Barboursville, Horton, and Keswick. This year we placed it outside in full sun during the summer, and we were rewarded with this single bloom, a starburst of greenish white petals with a frizzante of filaments bearing the anthers aloft, and a lurid lavender style bearing a sulfur yellow stigma. It grows rather slowly and admittedly we haven’t treated it as well as we should. We’ve carried it from house to house for the last seven years. No one there knew the name of it, and under our care it thrives on neglect. The plant was massive and quite striking, so with the owner’s permission we took home a cutting as a memento of the visit, doing little more than placing it in a south facing window and watering when we think of it. ![]() ![]() Outside of that little house was this very large succulent in a pot, the foliage had a pendulous, weeping quality. We settled in the old summer kitchen, which was the original plantation kitchen house. Thomas Jefferson is known to have been a frequent guest, and the peripatetic Marquis de Lafayette stayed there on his grand tour of the United States in 1824. This route was recently designated the Journey Through Hallowed Ground National Heritage Area in recognition of this part of the Virginia Piedmont’s role in the history of the nation (incidentally, Route 15 passes near Annefield some 134 miles to the south). The house fronts on Route 15, the storied “Old Carolina Road,” an Indian trading path that became a colonial road linking Pennsylvania and North Carolina. The house was enlarged in 1766 by Henry Fry (1738-1823), Joshua’s son. He was a member of the Virginia House of Burgesses and acquired the land in 1726, which he called Elim the name Meander was given to the property in the early 20th century. The house is a substantial old thing, begun by Joshua Fry (1699-1754), a surveyor and the author (with Peter Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson’s father) of the famous Fry-Jefferson Map of Virginia. Some years ago while on a wine tasting adventure in Central Virginia - one of our first, actually - we stayed at the Inn at Meander Plantation in Orange County. We were reminded of this passage not by a cactus, but close - by a succulent. The book reflects on achieving independence and finding peace and beauty in nature as one matures. It is not a question of preferring flowers or animals to human beings, but rather it is a recognition of limits - particularly physical limits - which brings her to the conclusion that humans must eventually abdicate their roles (whatever they may be), and that in this release there is a compensating joy. This occurs by accepting the harmony between human and natural rhythms. Sidonie Colette Colette by Irving Penn (1951)Ĭolette’s mother, Sido, simply states here what the author will soon learn in the course of the book: that at a certain age, individual human relationships must cease to be the primary focus of our lives as they give way to solidarity with the natural universe. So I beg you, Sir, to accept my sincere thanks and my regrets, together with my kind regards. It’s a very rare plant I’ve been given, and I’m told that in our climate it flowers only once every four years, Now, I am already a very old woman, and if I went away when my pink cactus is about to flower, I am certain I shouldn’t see it flower again. The reason is that my pink cactus is probably going to flower. All the same, I’m not going to accept your kind invitation, for the time being at any rate. You who live with her know how rarely I see her, how much her presence delights me, and I’m touched that you should ask me to come see her. You ask me to come and spend a week with you, which means I would be near my daughter, whom I adore. The book opens with a letter Colette’s mother wrote to Colette’s first husband, Henri de Jouvenel: We are reminded today of a haunting, beautiful passage from a work by the great French author Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette (1873–1954) called Break of Day ( La Naissance du jour) (1928). But it is the desperateness of losing which picks the flowers of memory, binds the bouquet. By means of an image we are often able to hold on to our lost belongings. ![]()
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