I Hope Ganesh Is Pleased

Most weeks, Thursday night is "date night" for hubby and me, and on most of those date night, we end up at the Bombay Bhel restaurant, enjoying our favourite Indian dishes. The staff there are some of the friendliest waiters and waitresses you could ever hope to have waiting on your table. They make you feel as though they are genuinely pleased to see you and not just to see your wallet. They smile and take a moment here and there to chat, to ask how you are, and that most Canadian of topics, to comment on the weather. Although the food is indeed special there, it is the combination of food and familiar, friendly faces that draws us back there so often.
Not so long ago, someone on staff set up a small shrine to the Lord Ganesh. It sits in the small foyer, nestled between the parking lot door and the door that opens into the seating area. There is generally some incense burning, making the place redolent with the scent of sandalwood. There is also an offering of food, perhaps a piece or two of fruit placed there. The statuette of Ganesh stands guard beside these items, and greets each patron with a gentle, beneficent smile. The final touch at the shrine is floral. On some days, there are simply flower petals scattered about the table the shrine calls home. On other days, there may be a potted plant or some cut flowers. Several weeks ago, I bought a bouquet to take there. It was the first time that I had done so, and my husband made sure I understood the need to have avoided the handling of any meat through the day, before I handled the flowers I intended to bring there. Knowing the particulars to be aware of, I stopped today at the store across the street and bought a bouquet again, to take with us tonight and present for inclusion at the shrine. It's a pre-packaged bouquet that includes daisies, carnations and eucalyptus branches. It's wrapped about in cellophane across which varying bright tones of pink have arranged themselves in graceful swirls, so it is already bright. Nestled inside the cello-wrap is the real eye-candy, however. I decided to carry the bouquet back without having any added packaging wrapped about it. Although the temperature at the moment is hovering at minus three degrees, most florists tend to set their storage refrigerators just below zero to minimize the respiratory activity of cut flowers and increase their longevity, so I was confident that my newly acquired beauties would not expire during their short trek across the street. As I walked, I was aware of incredible sensations being offered by the blossoms. First was the visual treat of seeing bright yellow daisies grinning up at me, like my own personal little suns shining on me. Surrounding the carnations, some of salmon pink and others of magenta- and amethyst-edged white winked up at me each time I peeked in at them. The other treat offered to me by these beauteous blooms was for my olfactory sense. The heady fragrance that the eucalyptus especially wafted up to me was not to be believed, particularly on a day still very much locked in the cold of a Canadian winter. Each time I inhaled, I buried my nose in the flowers, and the reality of the intersection receded. Each time I breathed in, I took the deepest breath I possibly could. Each time I smelled the heady perfume, I did my best to store away in my mind the exact notes of the spicy redolence nature was gifting me with at that moment. I still have the smile that the bouquet presented me with as I made my way across the street.
I hope tonight, when the flowers are placed in front of the Lord Ganesh, that my offering will please him as much as it pleased me.