03-25-2021， Thursday， cloudy in the morning, sunny in the afternoon.
The scenery of “spring-welcoming flowers” in my memory is framed as winter jasmine bushes filled with bright yellow-colored flowers. Therefore, in early spring, I often say: “Winter jasmine welcomes the spring.”
In March of 2021, I first time noticed that cornelian blooms ahead of winter jasmine to welcome spring on the East Coast. This surprise brought me great joy, as I really love flowers.
I recognized cornelian trees on 10-25-2020, the Lunar Double Nines Day (lunar calendar September 9th, a holiday similar to the National Grandparents Day in USA in terms of respecting and greeting older family members).
On that day, I was home alone rereading and enjoying the famous Tang poem, “Thoughts on Lunar Double Nines Day” by Tang dynasty poet WangWei (王维) . “One misses loved ones twice as much (倍思亲)” from the poem stimulated my deep longing for my late mother and brought back a hidden story about how I was actually an un-wanted child of my mother before I was born.
“Alone in a faraway place (独在异乡)”, I read WangWei’s poem slowly and tasted the loneliness as I was alone for more than a month now. I knew 茱萸(zhu yu), a plant, was associated with the Lunar Double Nines Day for long time, but I never saw it. I suddenly wanted to know: “What is 茱萸?”, the same as wanting to meet a old friend who I had never truly met before.
I did an online search in both Chinese and English and found the following information:
Cornelian (茱萸) is a tree with yellow flowers and red fruits, which usually grows in cold climates. There is a Chinese saying: “One sees cornelian flowers in the spring, its pretty shapes in the summer, its red fruits in the fall, and white snow on it in the winter.” I had never seen cornelian in warm Sichuan nor sunny California.
The cornelian, in Wang’s poem, referred to its fruits, very pretty with a color like ruby.
In China, wearing cornelian fruits on the Lunar Double Nines Day is similar to wearing artemisia argyi in the Dragon Boat Festival, both are Chinese folk customs that hope wearing those plants close to our body will let the aroma of the plants fight off evil and disease and bring us good fortune.
After seeing cornelian online, I realized that there are lots of carnelian trees on the campus of Brandeis University. Unfortunately, on the Lunar Double Nines Day, the cornelian fruits could not stand up the cold weather and were all gone. Afterwards, I began looking forward to seeing cornelian blooming again.
Silently longing for a flower in the fall and winter seasons is a joyful sweet journey, especially as a flower lover, in the COVID-19 quarantine period.
After waiting for more than five months, I finally saw the famous cornelian blooming again (I saw cornelian blooming last year as a nameless flower, without knowing its name). I was very satisified.
Little Episodes
1.Cornelian
“The cornelian tree grows to 5–12 m tall. The flowers are small (5–10 mm in diameter), with four yellow petals, produced in clusters of 10–25 together before the leaves appear. The fruit is an oblong red drupe 2 cm long and 1.5 cm in diameter, containing a single seed.” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornus_mas)
2. In Boston Public Garden, the name-tag of cornelian is “Cornelian Cherry Dogwood，Europe”
The cornelian tree in the photo is across from the famous Cheers Restaurants.
3. The Lunar Double Nines Day Poem, by WangWei
jiǔ yuè jiǔ rì yì shān dōng xiōng dì
《九月九日忆山东兄弟》
dú zài yì xiāng wéi yì kè
独 在 异 乡 为 异 客，
měi féng jiā jié bèi sī qīn
每 逢 佳 节 倍 思 亲。
yáo zhī xiōng dì dēng gāo chù
遥 知 兄 弟 登 高 处，
biàn chā zhū yú shǎo yī rén
遍 插 茱 萸 少 一 人。
4. Artemisia Argyi
” In traditional Chinese medicine, The herb is considered to increase the blood supply to the pelvic region and stimulate menstruation, help treat infertility, dysmenorrhea, asthma and coughs.” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemisia_argyi)
The Chinese folk believed that it could fight off evil spirits and attract good fortune. Hanging a bunch of fresh artemisia argyi on the door is one of the customs during the Dragon Boat Festival.