Perseverance
“Perseverance,” Al started, cradling his stitched-up hand against his chest.
“Pays off in the end,” Dean finished, knowing this talk by heart. “Cutting your finger off with a rose clipper isn’t perseverance, Dad. It’s just stupid.”
“It made you come trim my prize-winning roses.”
“I ripped out the damned bush.”
For some reason, this story resisted me in the making. It grew from the words perseverance, cradle, and rose. I took liberties with cradle, changing it to cradling.
I smiled when I saw the roses. Wayne bought me some long-stemmed roses a couple of weeks ago for no particular reason but there's one that doesn't want to let go. The bloom died but I noticed new leaves and so I trimmed it and put the piece of stem with the new leaves in a vase of water. No roots but... a new rose is blooming. Now that's perseverance ☺️🌹
I laughed out loud 🤣 thank you