logistics of petals and stems

Been a little while since I’ve typed up a blog post, thankfully not due to any unsavory circumstances. Work has been increasingly busy as we’ve moved into spring, digging holes and planting trees to decolonize Richmond one lawn at a time. Landscaping was not my first career choice but I’m thankful to always have a job with the company, especially knowing how important our work is to the area. So what was I really interested in lately? I couldn’t stand the idea of being in a warehouse or an office (eugh!) ever again. I did my time and being in those spaces would absolutely send me into a panic.

I had to be outside, I had to be around plants, I had to work with a crew that I vibed well with: Enter Nicole, an incredibly talented florist with a cute little shop in Bellevue. The second of her busiest holidays was coming up, Mother’s Day, and of course I was gonna show up to help. I was given her contact info the end of April by my absolute best friend who helped Nicole during busy holidays of previous years. We exchanged a few excited texts and she eventually asked what my availability was for the week following up to Mother’s Day. I’m pretty flexible if given good notice, and besides a couple of days I knew I had to keep for myself, I was open to working any day that she needed me.

Though I already have a job, landscaping native local ecotype plants is a little different from the logistics of flowers and stems. So yes, that does make me Two-Job Melly for the firs time probably ever. Both jobs earned through the success in achieving my degree. Fucking righteous.

Sophie, shop princess

My pizza prize, post-flower shop and pre-yardwork for my bestie

Chloe, shop turtle

Sunday, one week before Mother’s Day, I am stepping into the flower shop with nerves pricking at my sides and a brave heart in my chest; I can be a total wreck walking into spaces I’ve never professionally been in before. But I’m keeping my cool, I know I’m learning as I go. I just have to keep showing up. I met most of the people I would be working with for the week, all of whom were so helpful during my first few hours at the shop. Aside from Rose, who is still in high school, everyone else in the shop is older than I am, ranging from 10 years to around my parent’s age. Grace is up front with me most of the day, doing $25 simple flower wraps and giving me pointers here and there while we exchange a bit of small talk about our lives. She has 3 kids, I have one, where we live, the regular stuff you do with your coworkers.

About an hour into my shift, I finally get to meet Nicole. Shes got Sophie (pictured here!) snuggled up in her arms, greets me warmly and is ready to get to work. One of the first things I have to do as the new lacky is process flowers, not a very creative process but something that’s easy enough to do for my first day that I didn’t think I’d fuck up… which I did, a little bit, but thats okay. I’m really trying to overcome my own perfectionism and at least be consistent. Consistency is much more powerful than just never getting anything wrong in the first place.

I’m going through carnations, hydrangeas, lisianthus, peonys, hypericum berry… some stuff I recognize immediately, others I have to get a reminder of. Its been about a year since I had any practical floral design guidance but at least I’m not completely slipping! Around noon, Nicole’s partner Brad tells us if we can process everything by 2pm, he’ll get us all pizza. As broke as I have been, and as hungry as I am at that moment, getting the other 150 flower wraps counted and cleaned is a piece of… pizza. Ha! Anyway, we fly through the rest of the flowers and I’m happily greeted with a couple of slices of pepperoni.

My next day is Monday and I’m still a little nervous, I just don’t know what, or whom, I’m going to walk into that day. After a quick pep talk in the car (“You just have to show up. You know this. You’ve got this.”), I confidently popped in the back door of the shop and effectively startled a designer, pushing stems into a vase, that had never met me before.

“Oh, hi…. I’m Melissa. Nice to meet you.” I give a bright smile and she introduces herself as Delphia, and I want to ask if its an homage to the ever popular Delphinium that I’ve come to know so well as an amateur designer. Nicole pops her head around another corner, where her work space is, and says hello to me before coming back to her work. Since I had just come from a landscape maintenance job that morning, I was still in my work overalls, fitting the part of “horticulturist” through and through.

Monday is a bit more about answering phones, understanding details of pricing and delivery, really getting to know the ins-and-outs of how a flower shop works. Where pricing tags are and how they are organized, how Nicole prefers her coolers be organized and consolidated, how to keep rapport with customers and how to avoid complications with third-party flower sellers.

“Flower shops are all about logistics,” Brad said to me during a lull in the day. “Its a bunch of tiny moving parts with a bunch of different people.”

I chuckle a bit and go, “Designing is almost like the last thing you need to know before you open a shop.”

Just like in any creative business, the success isn’t strictly in the talent you have on staff but the consistency you have in all the other hands you need to help you and vendors you trust. I can’t promise that I’ll know everything but I’ll do my damnedest to figure it out and be sure to give similar results every time. Success isn’t about being perfect every time, just be consistent in how you treat customers and the work you produce.

Yeah, maybe I’m good at arranging flowers and color theory and balance and texture in an arrangement. I can grow the flowers, know how to care for them, process them, and I almost always give them away before I sell them. I still feel wet behind the ears in the presence of a 20-plus year successful business. I’m still pinching myself that I’ve even been given this opportunity. Just have to keep showing up, and show up, I did.

Can’t remember what day I took this… probably Thursday haha

I’m not back into the shop until a few days later, when were getting a bit busier and the pressure is really building for the upcoming holiday weekend. I’m answering phones a little more confidently, filling out vases with greens a bit faster, understanding the bits and bobs of my surroundings more every day. I’m tasked with smaller tasks for the shop, like filling water tubes for single roses or cutting out messages for delivery cards for the weekend, all those small parts that keep flower shops moving. Nicole likes to use paper and pencil for nearly everything, which can slow down an assembly line. I like to think she wants us to retain the info a little bit more by writing it down, which I am all for as an infinite pit of knowledge.

Two-Job Melly has to be on a jobsite in Tuckahoe that next day, so shes not back into the shop until Saturday.

“Which day would you say is busier for Mother’s Day— Saturday or Sunday?” I had asked Brad during my last shift while I helped Grace green out some vases.

“Saturday is definitely busier. Everyone wants to get their flowers and get out on Sunday, go to brunch, yknow? But Saturday gets the last minute walk-ins, people trying to make up for lost time.” Brad shrugs, cause at the end of the day, dollars don’t discriminate in the floral industry.

Though the consensus is that today is busier, I’m shocked at how I’m handling the pressure internally. I’m moving with the crew, staying focused and keeping customers moving in and out of the store. Thankfully Liz is concentrating on phone orders today while I assist customer’s in the shop. Here and there I’ll help her cut out messages for cards from online orders, tape them to our fancier cards and address the deliveries for drivers.

“Hand-written is nice, but on our busier days it saves time to just cut the message out, tape it into a card and send it on its way.” As she speaks, Nicole comes up from behind her and grabs the order form with the addressed card attached, continuing our assembly line of arrangements readily being stuffed into coolers. Between helping customers and petting Sophie, I couldn’t help but admire all that was in those cases: different combinations of complimentary colors and vases, ranging in sizes and styles that showcased incredible talent on staff. I was so lucky to be where I was, and it was right where I needed to be.

Beautiful rose delivery

Thankful for where I am in my life is an understatement, I know I’ve worked hard to get where I am. Despite plenty of setbacks, I managed to still end up doing most, if not all of, what I’ve wanted to do in my life. I’m still trying to settle into this person and revel in the feeling… its hard for me when I feel like I have to constantly stay moving. I’m a Taurus through and through, but the Aries moon and Sagittarius rising in me keep me in constant movement. Sometimes, for me, trying to relax is a competitive sport that I’m constantly fucking losing.

I ended up running some deliveries by the end of both of my days at the flower shop, getting paid for my mileage alongside tips and an hourly pay rate. It was one of the biggest paydays I had seen in a long time from work, reaffirming that I was on the right path with this job. Though I was initially hired as a temp, I was offered to come back outside of the busier seasons. Pretty incredible, right? That after waiting such a long time, I’ve found another job I just fit right into, that I’m confident that I’m supposed to be there.

That’s all anyone wants in the end, to feel like they belong somewhere. I’m happy to say I’ve found where I should be, in more ways than one.