From the sidewalk, we smell the lilies and sweet peas before entering this kingdom of zenitude, a light promise to take away in a strong paper case. The Hortense et Violette flower shop was opened barely two weeks ago on rue Fleury and the neighborhood’s residents are already flocking there, attracted by a little peace and pretty flowers. Peace, if we could buy it by the kilo, we would take three baskets delivered by doves. Without baby sighs.
On the other hand, at Hortense et Violette, we leave the sighs of adults at the door and embrace a certain idea of delicacy. Here, cloves and anemones, freesias and peonies, foxgloves and eucalyptus branches with a camphor aroma or mauve phacelias combine in roundness to offer bouquets of hope, even fragile, even if it fades one day. It was Neruda, this great poet, who wrote: “They can cut all the flowers, they will not prevent spring.” Hope can bloom again.
At the height of their existential angst as fifty-somethings defrocked from the health sector, Isabelle Ahmad, a microbiologist and engineering director at a vaccine factory, and Delphine Roigt, a clinical ethicist, dreamed of a fertile ground in which to repot themselves. “I asked myself where I felt best,” says Delphine. “It was at the florist’s!”
The lawyer who branched into the rare profession of ethicist in hospitals for more than 25 years did not see herself in a diver’s suit with a mask to defend the rights of patients during the pandemic. “I had to re-explain my job to each new boss. Even they don’t understand its importance. It’s always starting over.” Ethics? It can sometimes be summed up in one sentence: just because it’s legal doesn’t mean it’s moral. Delphine (who has just worked closely on the recent book End-of-life care: who decides? by the philosopher Jocelyne Saint-Arnaud) specifies: “It is support for decision-making in complex care situations where there are value issues. » There are often issues… especially with sick plants.
Playing in the hydrangeas
“We all thought at one point: I would give up everything to play in the flowers. Well, we did it! » laughs Delphine, who resigned on October 23, 2020 after a meeting with her new boss (who was being interviewed without knowing it) and started her DEP in floristry ten days later. “The question I get asked the most is: “Have you thought about your retirement and your pension fund?” If I had wanted to make money, I would have become an electrician. In ethics, we need freedom, confidence to create. » And with flowers, she also found a silent poetry and the power to soothe.
Happiness is the art of making a bouquet with the flowers that are within our reach.
Isabelle was also looking for meaning in her work and found more in horticultural therapy, in the company of plants: “I am no longer capable of large organizations that have no heart. The most beautiful asset we have is human beings. If they do not take care of them, they will go nowhere.” Delphine agrees: “I could no longer help people within an organization that mistreats the world. After that, they are told to do yoga, journaling and meditation. Because you are too weak? I don’t want to participate in this anymore.”
This loyal woman, whose professional qualities and rigor I was able to appreciate for one of my books, is passionate about justice in its noblest sense.
While the crocuses were not yet growing under the snow, Isabelle found the premises in Ahuntsic in January, contacted Delphine to put on her apron as a neighborhood florist with an ethical mission.
Fifty years, an age when many dreams live, an age which is still, if not the flower of life, the age of flowers.
This way, irises and hydrangeas, goat’s beard and violets. The two florists sell Quebec (or even Canadian) products, local flowers, without plastic tubes or packaging. There are no blue roses or exotic birds of paradise here, no flowers that have traveled from Ecuador or Mexico, no stiff ferns.
“There is a lot of education to be done,” notes Delphine. We don’t yet know what we will do for the red roses for Valentine’s Day…” Isabelle rolls her eyes: “I agree to dream with you! »
Bellflowers and buttercups
Delphine loves anemones and blue thistles, Isabelle, bellflowers and buttercups. They insist on the traceability of their little protégées with fragile petals, hoping that producers will take over in the winter like this tulip producer in Grand-Métis. Flowers are part of all the important events in life, from birth to death, including love, strong emotions and forgiveness.
Reality sometimes quenches hope. That is why, against all odds, hope survives.
“Our philosophy is to be involved every day. The little perky weekday bouquet at $20 or $30. And people are happy to pick it up after going to the bakery next door. » And Delphine insists on talking about floral arrangements, an art that goes beyond the simple wreath. And movement slow flowers (as the slow food), flowers that travel little, eco-responsible, with less waste, a big trend.
Heavy as the public can sometimes be. “Since the pandemic, it’s worse, people are very on edge,” notes Delphine, who did internships in the shop after her course. “Flowers are calming!” At least, we hope so, and before our funerals.
The two budding florists discover the joys of commerce. Almost before our eyes, two customers who came to buy plants stole the metal watering can from the new traders. “There are people who come to cut the flowers in our bins outside,” a bewildered Isabelle whispers to me.
Life is not a rose garden, far from it. But some cultivate thorns, others beauty. And the flower fairy says that it is what you choose to water that will eventually grow in you.
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