a color story: red branches and the white flowers

About two weeks ago, a vase filled with pruned red branches in the living room. It stayed that way until I observed a miracle. White/green flowers (or maybe berries) appeared out the branch's tip. 

Wow. Was this real life?

In the world of ornaments, they were usually plastic or still life. Christmas trees decorated with reflective sphere balls. Fake plastic flowers filled unrealized vases. Even common natural ornaments like pampass grass adorned interior spaces with their tall and feather-like blades. 

So, I made the same assumption with the red branches; they will sit in the vase like an inanimate object. Pretty branches in a vase. What more could come out of it?

It was, however, a different situation with these "ornaments" when the white clusters appeared. Did somebody glue these on as a sick joke? How could this happen? Wasn't the red skin a heavy energy feature for the plant? I thought that once the branch cut off ( or pruned) it would just fade off like a flower or at best just stay the same. 

I scanned the unusual ornament via Google Lens and they were Red Oiser Dogwood branches, native to Ontario, Canada.

Red twig dogwood will brighten your winter landscaping with its bright red branches, but the shrubs can also provide four-season interest, with beautiful spring blossoms, variegated leaves during summer, and berries from summer to fall. 

Wow. It could do it all. Red branches in the winter. Spring blossoms. Summer/Fall Berries. And it could still transform while off the ground? I checked whether the vase had water. It doesn't. 

The resistance, utility, and vitality of the Dogwood red branch impacted my impressions on the color, red. My current impressions on red fluxed between alertness via stop signs and fragility like a flower's pedal. But, red could mean life and strength; the red branch's miracle made that clear. 

Did I underestimate the red branch's story as it sat in the vase? Yeah.

Have I counted the dog out of the plant even when it fought back with flowers? Probably. 

Do I feel humbled? Yup. Can't judge a book by its cover. Even with plants. 

Huh. Maybe I should spend less energy with flowers. They were fragile after all.  

I returned to the vase and witnessed a red which made the most out of its situation; it blossomed with its green/white bundles of joy. I double checked whether it had water in the vase. Still, nope. Not entirely convinced by the whole situation. 

The dogwood branch wasn't a red ornament; it was a sign of resilience.