Goodbye Judy Blue...

I was asked yesterday if the blue flowers I've been blipping recently were significant. I thought not at first, but then I remembered something, almost as a waking dream, of when I was a really wee girl, I read the story of the Blue Rose. This was the rarest and most beautiful flower in the whole world, and to win the eternal love of his princess, the brave knight had to travel far lands, and endure trials and challenges, climbing to the highest mountaintop, to retrieve this perfect bloom for his love.

I remember thinking that was the most amazing story in the world and that the blue rose must be the most fantastical thing in nature - the ultimate beauty. It represented for me total love - that one would travel so far, and endure so much, to find something so beautiful for the love of another. So, yeah...I've decided its significant.

This had to be the choice today as we said goodbye to another rare and beautiful part of nature - Judy - a work colleague who died from cancer last week at a cruelly young age. She was such a wonderful human being, so full of life, love, compassion, insight and inspiration. It was a privilege and a joy to know her. Her service was simple, heartfelt and full of love - a fitting tribute in too many ways to mention. Judy had a huge love for the sea - she adored it - so the picture tonight is for Judy - a rare flower to behold before an "endless consoling sea" (Betjeman).

This extract is from her Order of Service. Love to you Judy - and wishing you fair winds whatever sea you are travelling on. RIPx

I am standing on the foreshore. A ship at my side spreads her white sails in the morning breeze and starts for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength and I stand and watch her until at length she hangs like a speck of white cloud just where the sea and sky come down to mingle with each other. Then someone at my side says, "There! She's gone!" "Gone where?" "Gone from my sight, that's all." She is just as large in mast and spar and hull as she ever was when she left my side; just as able to bear her load of living freight to the place of her destination. Her diminished size is in me, not in her. And just at that moment when someone at my side says, "There" She's gone!" there are other eyes watching her coming and other voices ready to take up the glad shout, "Here she comes!"
Victor Hugo