thank you!

thank you: izzy, christian, mark, jan, maya, jacqui, abby, denise, ally, hendy [edit - and eva!!] for your kind responses!!! they've made me smile silly smiles to myself whenever i've remembered them!! hehe.

here's a little bit of trivia, just in case you're wondering why this blog is called 'ephemeral' and why the url is 'riotofroses'.

both are references from the little prince by antoine de saint-exupéry. i set up this blog shortly after i finished reading the book a number of years ago. if you haven't read it, you should! it's just a very short children's book. the story is simple, profound, light-hearted, serious, cheerful, sorrowful, real and abstract - all at the same time!

*

"Well?" said the geographer expectantly.

"Oh, where I live," said the little prince, "it is not very interesting. It is all so small. I have three volcanoes. Two volcanoes are active and the other is extinct. But one never knows."

"One never knows," said the geographer.

"I have also a flower."

"We do not record flowers," said the geographer.

"Why is that? The flower is the most beautiful thing on my planet!"

"We do not record them," said the geographer, "because they are ephemeral."

"What does that mean-- 'ephemeral'?"

"It means, 'which is in danger of speedy disappearance.'"

"Is my flower in danger of speedy disappearance?"

"Certainly it is."

"My flower is ephemeral," the little prince said to himself, "and she has only four thorns to defend herself against the world. And I have left her on my planet, all alone!"

*

The little prince gazed at them. They all looked like his flower.

"Who are you?" he demanded, thunderstruck.

"We are roses," the roses said.

And he was overcome with sadness. His flower had told him that she was the only one of her kind in all the universe. And here were five thousand of them, all alike, in one single garden!

"She would be very much annoyed," he said to himself, "if she should see that... she would cough most dreadfully, and she would pretend that she was dying, to avoid being laughed at. And I should be obliged to pretend that I was nursing her back to life-- for if I did not do that, to humble myself also, she would really allow herself to die..."

Then he went on with his reflections: "I thought that I was rich, with a flower that was unique in all the world; and all I had was a common rose."

And he lay down in the grass and cried.

*

"He was just a fox like a hundred thousand foxes. But I made him my friend and now he is unique in the world."

"Go and have another look at the roses. And you will understand that yours is indeed unique in all world."

"It is the time you lavished on your rose which makes your rose so important."

"For what you have tamed, you become responsible forever."

*

"If you love a flower which happens to be on a star, it is sweet at night to gaze at the sky. All stars are a riot of flowers."

"The stars are beautiful because of a flower one cannot see.."

"Be it a house, the stars or the desert, the source of their beauty cannot be seen!"

"The eyes are blind. One must look with the heart."