Flowers for my mother

It was a week and a half ago that I went up to San Francisco to see my mother after her first surgery. She looked great and there was no way that we would have known that she would not be with us for much longer. She was sitting up and looking good, but needed to get some rest. In classic Betty style, she asked us to go visit the Conservatory of Flowers, which was located in Golden Gate Park, and near the hospital. So...while she rested, my brother sister and I all went over to see the flowers and train set.

There were some really beautiful flowers at this time of year. It was great to take pictures of them and then, bring the camera to the hospital to show them to my mother.

A reflection of the ceiling of the Conservatory photographed in one of the ponds and through some bamboo shoots.

I am not sure why, but this one brown leave caught my attention. It seemed to stand out from everything else, as if it was craving attention.

The ceiling of the Conservatory had some rainbow colored stained glass windows and I wanted to capture that in some images. But I wanted to show them in a creative way. So, I found this pretty formation of leaves and shot this at an aperture that would highlight the leaves while giving a hint of the stained glass.

As I turned the corner into a new area of the exhibition, I came across this tree trunk and thought "wow, that looks like a tortoise".  And then I looked down at the sign and noticed that this is called a Tortoise Plant. Voila!

My father used to love orchids and he passed that on to all of us. When we came across this grouping, we all stopped and admired them. My sister, who likes to paint, asked me to shoot this image for her.

And then...in the last room of the exhibit, we found the model train. Most of this display was made with recycled parts (old cassette tapes, computer parts....). I took a couple of pictures of the train set, since my mom has mentioned it to us. But in looking at the images, it really needed something else to make it more interesting. And then...I saw this really cute little boy who was memorized by the trains. A perfect subject for my photos!

I love the innocence in his expressions and that childhood wonder is his eyes. I made sure to show these to my mom when we returned to her hospital room.

It was my mom's wish for us to go to the Conservatory of Flowers, but now knowing that we had so little time left with her, I wish that I had just stayed and held her hand while she was sleeping.