Long lasting flowers

This beautiful orchid with flowers the size of tea plates is a gift from a very good lifelong friend. She and I have known each other since we were 13, which is longer ago than I care to recall. The beauty of orchids is that they last such a long time, and I treasure this one as a daily reminder of treasured friendship.

Thanks to her, and to Longfellow for these very apt words.

I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?

Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.

Ernest Wadsworth Longfellow