Felicia grew up on a small farm on the outskirts of a close-knit town, with her mother and father. As an only child, Felicia had to keep herself busy, often venturing outdoors to play with the animals, or explore the bush around their fenced farmland.
Ever since she was young, Felicia has been working in their vegetable garden alongside her father. Often they would go out at all times of the day for the 'perfect harvest'. He taught her the names of different plants, how to care for them, what to look out for when weeding and when to harvest. Her father's attention to detail became ingrained into Felicia's personality over the years, making her a bit of a perfectionist when it came to harvesting times of their garden. Some days she would get up at 3:45am just to pull up the perfect potatoes, or stay up at night until 11:30pm just to get the shiniest apples off the trees.
While her father slaved over their garden outdoors, his years in the sun clearly etched into his brown tanned skin, her mother would slave away in their country-styled kitchen over the steaming pots and pans or making sure the fire was stoked long enough to cook their family fresh breads and dough.
When Felicia wasn't in the garden with her father, or out playing in the big wide world, she was helping her mother prepare their meals. As a young girl, her father crafted her a small stool so that she could stand up over the sink to help her mother wash the vegetables, and as she got older, her mother entrusted her to start chopping them, or putting the pans onto the stove to boil.
The small family had a good relationship with their neighbors, often they would all gather for a street party, alternating households as hosts. During these parties, they would share their plates of food, their harvestables, and spices. One of their neighbors was particularly fond of exquisite spices, the husband would often travel to exotic places and bring back all kinds of new flavors for them all to try.
As Felicia got older, she began loving these parties, just to wait on the new flavor of the week. She had a great sense of taste and did not often find something that couldn't satisfy her taste buds. She began preparing their meals more often as her mother's health began declining and her father's knees slowed him in the garden.
One of the other eccentric members in their community, a little old lady that lived on the other side of the creek closer to town used to tell Felicia "make sure you stop and smell the flowers" any time she saw her running about town. When she was younger, Felicia wasn't sure what the old lady meant, but as she began working harder and harder for her parents, she thought back to that lady's saying and tried to figure out where she went wrong. She had long thought her childhood was perfect, her family was healthy, they lived active lives and kept good company. So why was the lady's sayings now coming back to her, as she now slaved in the kitchen and worked tirelessly in the garden more than ever?
Over the coming years, Felicia's parents could no longer look after their farm, they told Felicia it was okay to sell it and move closer to town, more fitting for them to get about. Felicia finally caved and set her parents up in a small home near the town center. She sold off half of their farm land, but kept a small area for herself as her parents asked. She began a new garden in her smaller plot of land, and though she kept some of the standard plants that she had grown with her father, she ventured out and planted some flowers. She often found herself taking a moment to smell each one individually while she was out harvesting the perfect vegetables and fruits. When she finally realized what that silly old lady from her youth meant with her saying, she laughed to herself, shook her head and came up with an idea of sharing her perfectly smelling flowers with the community in town. Perhaps she could open a flower shop, she could even trade them for the spices she so longed for from her past neighbors, how she would love to get her hands on those spices again to kick up the flavor of her home-cooked meals.
Comments