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Flower Days in Remalna are the days of celebration when a person is accepted by family and community as having crossed the threshold from child to adult, and thus is eligible to marry. The day after the flower day, the person starts wearing adult clothes, instead of the children's outfits that are pretty much unisex. (And some places are stricter about that than others.)[1]. In Remalna, once people have passed their flower day, they no longer dance the children's dances, even though they may have been dancing the adult dances for years.[2]
The term Flower Day can be confusing because historically, some of the eastern kingdoms--such as Colend and Sartor--have for centuries termed the first day of spring (generally regarded as Fourthmonth Firstday) Flower Day, and in many countries, that was the day when people would announce engagements. Many attribute the present Flower Day traditions to Bermund, whose rulers were not human, though they assumed human form when taking up residence on this world. The first day of spring in Bermund was when the people would take the living blossoms and blooms brought in at the end of harvest season, and kept through winter, to the outside, where they would replant them. But these people have an innate magic, which enables them to preserve cut flowers, and then replace them in soil, where they take root.
In Bermund, the visitor would be amazed to walk about on the first mild day and see blossoms taking root everywhere. In Sartor, the flowers in conservatories are brought out to plant in gardens and public parks, followed by various celebrations. Pretty much universally on the Sartoran continent window boxes go from inside to outside on that day.
Social customs joined with the reappearance of gardens are weddings, engagements, terms of service, and in some lands, such as Colend there was a celebration in which all distinction of rank vanished that day. Anyone could dance and flirt with anyone else. Ideally it was risk-free fun, but humans being what they are, it didn't always work out that way. Even after the custom faded, at the eastern end of the Sartoran continent, for many years, calling someone a "Flower Day Flirt" meant someone who sets out on purpose to break hearts, just for the fun of it. "Flower Promises" meant promises that would last the length of Flower Day--or would soon wither and fade. In some places, to give someone flowers is to call them faithless.
Remalna, which is closer to Sartor, never had this custom, which is why Flower Day has remained a coming of age celebration. It is usually celebrated on or close to one's Name Day, and it occurs anywhere from age sixteen to twenty.
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