a solitary bloom

A solitary bloom appeared on my gardenia bush yesterday, after 3 months of dormancy. I had already grieved over its apparently short blooming season of this year, and had resigned myself to the idea of waiting until next summer to see another of its lovely white flowers. But yesterday, as I am stubbornly accustomed to doing, I looked at it in passing and then, surprised, looked again. I gasped--sure enough, there was a brilliant new bloom.
And then my eyes welled up. You see, I latched on to that flower as a symbol of new hope, when hope is lost. As a sign that sometimes, every once in a while, we get a glimpse of the reason behind all the lost hopes that have been snowing us under.
Yesterday just happened to also be the day that, after 6 months of fruitless job-hunting and self-confidence crushing work experiences, I stumbled upon a gift of a job. This is going to be work that I will delve into with all my energy and with all my heart, and it is work that I will get to claim, to see the immediate fruit of. And, most amazing of all to me, in my up-to-this-point state of work self-confidence, it is exactly, precisely what I can do, can do well, and what invigorates me as I do it.
My single surprise of a new bloom is lovely indeed.