By Carina Magyar in Flowers — Apr 17, 2023

VIII: Pansy

The story of the stepmother flower.

A plethora of purple pansies. Photo by welcometojo_ / Unsplash

Good morning. Today is octidi, the 28th of Germinal, Year CCXXXI. We celebrate la pensée, the thinking person's window box flower.

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Our third potentially purple flower in a row – these are a subset of violets – got it's name from being a traditional bouquet of remembrance. It's another instance of the English name being a butchered version of the French word, and is literally just the feminine past participle of "thought," as in: "Don't you. (Ba-dum ba-da-dum.) Forget about me. Don't don't don't don't. Don't you. (Ba-dum ba-da-dum.) Forget about me." My best wishes on not having that song stuck in your head all morning now.

Things have taken an unexpectedly dark turn in the purple flowers part of Germinal. While the weather warms and life comes bursting out all over, we've had a flower of mourning, a flower of poison, and now a flower of remembrance. Did something bad happen to Fabre d'Eglantine at this time of year? Did he just anticipate tax day? (Fun fact, he died in Year II on 16 Germinal, Lettuce Day. So yes, something bad did happen to him.)

Pansies aren't necessarily associated with death as much as our previous purple pals, but they are called stepmother flowers in Central Europe. I'm not one to participate in the Germanic trashing of stepmothers that Walt Disney managed to revive and reify the world over, but the reason pansies are named after stepmothers is a story told "by" them that is definitely dark.

VIII: Pansy

VII: Anemone

IX: Blueberry

VII: Anemone

IX: Blueberry

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