The flower shop on Palmach Street in Old Katamon of Jerusalem was falling apart. It stood beside a framing store, with mirrors of all sizes hung outside, showing passerby's how they looked walking on the sidewalk, a glimpse of how we appear in the outside world. Some would look at the reflection out of the corner of their eyes, others would avoid the mirrors altogether, and children would stop and stare at their faces and coats and boots surrounded by the street life.
The flower shop was decrepit, with a tin roof that didn't keep out the rain or cold in winter, though rain was rare. On the rainiest days the owner placed the buckets of roses, ranunculae and poppies under the leaks, turning his roofing problem into a blessing. The buckets of flowers lined the sidewalk, often getting in the way of people's feet, of strollers, or stolen wagons from the supermarket across the street. From the early morning when the owner and his wife would leave their tiny two bedroom apartment attached to the shop to open the doors, they'd begin taking out the buckets of flowers and lining the sidewalk. By the end of the day, when the last customer ran in for a bouquet for a birthday or forgotten occasion, the buckets were shoved back into the shop, barely leaving room to close the door.
Often a customer would enter the shop, appalled by the clutter and lack of space, to find no human among the sunflower stalks, the baby's breath, the rotting roses in the back and the newly delivered birds of paradise. It was like finding a monster in a lullaby; where people expected to find beauty and order and another world, they were often horrified at this flower shop left so unkempt, so dirty, so brutally uninspiring.
After recovering from the initial shock of the place, they'd notice a small handwritten sign written on a piece of cardboard that read "next door." And feeling like a trespasser, they'd exit, frantically searching for the owner. Yet even when they found the tiny apartment attached, it was common for the door to be half ajar with no one in the kitchen, but a pot of cous-cous or a frying pan with an omelet cooking, and an ashtray cradling a lit cigarette on the table. The trespasser would stand completely still, bouquet in hand, partly relishing the rare feeling of being in a strange home, uninvited but not unwelcome. After that miniature eternity, the owner would slowly shuffle into the kitchen and nod at the patron. "I'd like to buy these..." he or she'd say, feeling a need to justify their presence in this man's kitchen. "Twenty," the owner would say, though he'd sell that same bouquet to the next man for only 15, or maybe 25. He'd conjure up a price based on a number of variables; mostly the demeanor of the customer, the traffic of the day thus far, and his wife's mood.
It was more common than not that the customer would bargain with the owner for a better price, pointing out that the roses were already wilting, or that there was more filler than blossoms in the bouquet. Sometimes it would work, other times the owner would so adamantly refuse the offer, stating he'd rather lose the business than sell his flowers to such a person.
On nights that I had left over cash from food shopping I would stop at the flower shop for a simple bouquet of ranunculas which I would display in a green mosaic vase on my coffee table. The round, satiny ranunculas in their maroons, pinks, and canary yellows always caught my eye. I would usually buy a bunch for 15, once or twice for ten as the last sale of the night.
One night I noticed a handwritten sign hanging by a piece of purple ribbon near the door, nearly buried among the hundreds of ads and loitering taped up on the windows of the shop by locals. It read: "Help wanted. Inquire within. If empty, Kitchen. If closed, call." The handwriting was that of a man in denial of asking for help. There was a man buying flowers with long dreadlocks who I had seen moments before in the supermarket. I grabbed a bunch of purple poppies. There we were, three of us, all in the same crammed space suddenly. Certain things I prefer to buy alone - free of the gaze or pressure from other customers; flowers being one of them, and certain types of jewelry. Now with the job opportunity, I really preferred the dread-locked man wasn't there too, and he looked at me as I mustered up the money to pay for my bunch and the courage to ask the owner, "are you hiring?"
"Yeah. You know flowers?"
The owner's wife was a Tunisian red head who always had a cigarette and a Turkish coffee. She walked away from the laundry line where she was hanging clothing to dry right there on the street. Her face was weathered and tough, and she barely ever smiled, always looking you right in the eye. She was taller than her husband and appeared to be much younger than him, judging by her hair, her figure, and her clothing. But her face was wrinkled beyond her years and gave her away. She always said, "nothing is ever enough for him," making a bouquet with a cigarette on her lip. Now she was looking at me and sizing me up for the job.
"I love them..I study arranging and I have good hands..." I reassured the two, feigning a confidence I always wished I possessed. She puffed the cigarette and looked at her husband. He was wearing what he always wore: a navy blue ski cap, pajama pants with elastic that was stretched out, argyle slippers, and a plaid jacket. He stuttered slightly and his voice was hoarse and worsening by the day. But he had kind eyes and he was hopeful, and he was the only person to call her by her french name.
He asked, "can you make a bouquet?" leading me inside to the table with the tools I had never used before. I was unprepared and wanted to practice with my ranunculas first. I thought quickly. "Can I come back? I have the milk in my bags and it's late..." He wrote down a phone number.
"Come tomorrow." He was hopeful, like me. His wife went back inside.
I got home and tried to make a bouquet like they did in the books, but the ranunculas looked best just as they fell naturally in the vase. After trying again and again, I was discouraged and dreaded the performance of making a bouquet to prove my eligibility. I thought about canceling, avoiding that part of the street forever, and not having ranunculas in my green vase on the table anymore.
I never made a sample bouquet, but I got that job. They needed me to start right away. I'll never forget how it felt to sell my first bouquet of yellow and orange roses, when the owner whose name I don't know if I ever really knew (or needed to), smiled at me for the first time since I met him and told me with his eyes, "I knew I could trust you." My days as a florist there were full of life: decaying flowers, flooding rains, flowers for births, flowers in shapes of crowns for children to wear. Roses the colors of love itself, thorns pricking my hands, cigarette smoke mixed with the breath of the flowers, mixed with the demands and stories of the customers. Cats jumping in the holes in the roof, spider webs around abandoned furniture piled up in the back of the shop, shoved aside in reach for the perfect flower to complete a bouquet. I would sweep the floors constantly, trying to soften the place and I'd smile at the customers triple - one for me, two for the owner and his wife. I had a beautiful experience, working for the only flower shop owners in the world who didn't hide their imperfections from anyone.
