Orange lilies coming into bloom
The lobby of the Sheraton Hotel in Guildford is dotted with striped overstuffed sofas with cushions. They're all too easy to sink into. Among the few armchairs of the same design, some are conveniently located near tables.
During the Surrey International Writers' Conference, there was one such armchair I sat in on the first day and kept coming back to.
It was positioned by a large round table with a glass top. Plenty of space to set down a coffee cup and spread out papers while sitting in comfort. If I'd wanted to, I could even have used that surface for my netbook with its external mouse.
At the back of this table were two seasonably appropriate flower arrangements in tall square glass vases.
One was filled with a wintry group of shapely bare branches with a single dried orange flower among them. The other contained a large arrangement of live orange lilies, mostly still in bud.
On the first day of the conference, only one flower was in bloom; by the end, the a whole group of buds on each stem had opened and more were about to burst.
Who knows? Maybe by next October, the work of a crop of the writers who attended the conference will also flower and bear fruit.
During the Surrey International Writers' Conference, there was one such armchair I sat in on the first day and kept coming back to.
It was positioned by a large round table with a glass top. Plenty of space to set down a coffee cup and spread out papers while sitting in comfort. If I'd wanted to, I could even have used that surface for my netbook with its external mouse.
At the back of this table were two seasonably appropriate flower arrangements in tall square glass vases.
One was filled with a wintry group of shapely bare branches with a single dried orange flower among them. The other contained a large arrangement of live orange lilies, mostly still in bud.
On the first day of the conference, only one flower was in bloom; by the end, the a whole group of buds on each stem had opened and more were about to burst.
Who knows? Maybe by next October, the work of a crop of the writers who attended the conference will also flower and bear fruit.