How strange it is, you can resist tears victoriously, you can carry yourself very well at the most difficult moments. And then... you find a flower in bloom that was still closed the day before, -- a letter falls from a drawer, -- and everything falls apart.

  --French writer Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette (1873-1954) in a letter sent to her friend Marguerite Moreno, who had just lost her husband. Colette was referring to her own mother's letter. Incident described in Colette et Sido: le dialogue par l'écriture (2009), by Graciela Conte-Stirling.

Que c'est curieux, on résiste victorieusement aux larmes, on se "tient" très bien aux minutes les plus dures. Et puis... on découvre, fleurie, une fleur encore fermée la veille, -- une lettre tombe d'un tiroir, -- et tout tombe.