The Sunflowers

When sunflowers are young, they face east to watch the sunrise. Craning their vibrant green necks, they raise their golden faces to the sun and faithfully follow its rays to the west. In darkness, they slowly turn their faces back to the east, and at dawn's first light they prepare to repeat their daily ritual.

Until one day, they stop.

I remember the moment that I fell in love with him. Even as I felt myself falling, my internal dialogue argued that it was too soon, too circumstantial—that I should wait until it wasn't a beautiful summer day on the water, and then see if I still think I'm in love. "Wait until his tan isn't so perfect, and you don't have a glass of Sauvignon Blanc in your hand: wait until you know for sure," my rational side advised.

But in that moment, I did know for sure. He looked out over the waves, one hand holding his wine glass as the other casually combed his fingers through his long blonde hair. I couldn't take my eyes off of him.

I will forever hold that first weekend of sun-soaked summer days at the lake in my heart. The memories of wading through the clear water together, being struck by how happy I looked in the reflection of his aviators, will always stay with me. From the morning coffee to the cider-filled bonfires at sunset, everything about our time there felt too good to be true. It had never occurred to me that it was.

An afternoon bike ride led us to the most expansive field of brilliantly blooming sunflowers that I had ever seen. They towered elegantly for as far as the eye could see, their faces basking in the August sunlight, looking to the bright blue skies as eagerly as I looked to him. I hadn't brought my phone to take any photos, but I was positive that we would be back.

Months later, we did visit the sunflowers again. Time had passed, and so had the beauty. This time, their dried, bare faces turned downward and their browned spines bent dejectedly. Their golden petals we had once so admired were just another memory of the perfection of those long summer days that we had spent together.

Seasons passed before our next return, when snow replaced the sand and Christmas lights replaced the fireflies. The first to arrive, we huddled under a blanket on the living room couch as we waited for the heat to surround us. It was on that frozen night that I finally told him that I was in love with him. He kissed me like he had never kissed me before, and I waited.

But he never said it back.

Eventually, the day comes when the sunflower stops following the sun. I wonder if it knows when that day is coming.

I didn’t.

Months after he and I ended, I could not stop thinking about the sunflowers. I had never before experienced such contrasting images of the same place. One beautiful, vibrant, full of life and promise, and the other a graveyard of what once had been so idyllic. I could not erase the images from my mind any easier than I could forget that moment on the water, the sound of his laugh and the sound of the waves.

I loved him with my whole heart, and I will never regret that. I surrendered myself, as helpless as the sunflowers following the sun.

Whenever I look into the face of a sunflower, I will be back on that summer day with a heart full of hope and a blissful unawareness of what was to come. Now, like those fields of sunflowers, I turn away from the darkness and prepare to feel the sunshine on my face again.