There’s no shortage of passion in Stephen Humble’s life. Flowers, music and art are life forces.

“I’ve never been able to settle with just one of them,” he explains. “I have to do them all.” So he does.

After designing floral arrangements at In Bloom, Stephen goes home and designs cards. He paints on textured paper, photographic paper, or art paper using assorted pens from transparent to opaque. Texas Art Supply, where he goes once a week to replace pens, loves him.

No two cards are alike. “When I make a card, it’s heartfelt and specifically designed for the recipient,” Stephen says.

It shows. Each card is given a title, which you can read on the back along with the date and Stephen’s phone number all handwritten. No email address here.

Whether a card serves as a birthday wish, Thanksgiving greeting or a reminder to an elderly person that they are not forgotten, two things are clear in each piece. Time and thought. Heart and hand connection.

Born in Port Arthur, Texas, Stephen claims that he’s been drawing since he could hold a pencil. At Church, where his father served as pastor, his mother would hand him a hymnal — and a pencil and crayons.

“Probably to keep me quiet,” Stephen laughs. Along the edges of a page, he might do scroll work or draw flowers, birds and crosses.

At age three, he sang his first solo in the Church. His father, realizing his musical talent, later bought Stephen a piano. Still later, in other places of worship, Stephen served as the Church musician, playing the organ and piano.

In first grade, Stephen won an art award from the University Interscholastic League. Using pastels, he’d drawn a squirrel in an oak tree eating an acorn. From then on, he never stopped drawing.

“My family nurtured my talent my entire life,” Stephen says.

He developed a love for flowers through his Aunt Lois. “She taught me how to see beauty in the tiniest flower like a Bluet,” he explains, his thumb pressing the tip of his little finger. “Beauty in forms like bird’s nests and wasp’s nests. How beautiful things are that most people trample over.”

He entered Baylor University on a voice scholarship but later became restless. He took a job in Beaumont working as a visual merchandizing person at The White House, which as Stephen described was the Sakowitz of Beaumont. Interestingly, a job offer in the visual department of Sakowitz brought him to Houston in 1977.

In Houston he was introduced to the floral designer, Leonard Thorpe. Stephen decided then that he wanted to become a floral designer.

“Leonard had such a flair for flowers,” Stephen says. Two years later, Stephen was working as a designer at Charles Thomas of Houston, a florist shop in the River Oaks Shopping Center.

In 1985, Stephen moved to Beverly Hills, California and worked for David Jones Custom Florist. He arranged flowers for Nancy and Ronald Reagan and helped in planning one of Liz Taylor’s weddings. He also sang as a soloist at St. Victor’s Catholic Church.

“It was close to the flower shop,” Stephen adds.

The Accident

In 1989, Stephen's life changed dramatically. While crossing the street, he was hit by a car.

“I flew over the car and cracked my head open,” Stephen reports. The injury caused him to lose his short-term memory but not his ability to draw, arrange flowers, sing and play the piano.

He entered rehab at Rancho Los Amigos in Downey, California. As part of his two-month rehabilitation, the hospital purchased flowers and set up a flower shop.

“I taught people how to process flowers,” Stephen says. “They were retraining me without me even knowing it!” Lovely.

After his rehab, Stephen was homesick for Texas and moved home to live with his parents for a time. He took a job working at Petals, a florist shop in Beaumont. In 1993, he returned to Houston and began working at In Bloom.

“The rest is history,” Stephen smiles. Interesting history.

Now at age 58, Stephen has woven a world. Flowers, music and art thread through his life like a loosely plated braid.

As for his cards, Stephen says, “My mission in life is to maintain the written communication between loved ones. So many texts and email. People are being fired from their jobs . . . proposed to . . . divorcing . . . with text messages!”

“With so much computerized correspondence,” Stephen says, “it warms people’s hearts to receive a personal message in the form of a card and inscription.”

Each card takes from one to three hours to make. Last Christmas he painted 70 to 80 cards and mailed them to loved ones.

One of Stephen’s friends suggested that he advertise his cards on the Internet. Smiling politely as if I’d made the suggestion, Stephen says, “That’s exactly what I’m against. I don’t want to reproduce them. They will not be art to me if they are not personal in nature.”

Stephen believes that man doesn’t create. He re-creates. “Everything is here!” he says, his hands opened. “Music is in the air. You choose the notes. Colors are in the light and the dark. We choose the ones that we show through our art.”

Recently, Stephen took his Yamaha keyboard and visited a friend in hospice. After playing "His Eye is on the Sparrow," his friend was grateful. “God kept me alive long enough to hear you sing and to receive your cards,” she told him.

We are still visiting when Stephen reaches for a pink textured paper like he’d suddenly remembered something. “I’ve been seeing amaryllis in this paper,” he says. Seconds later, he is painting.

It is time to leave but I want one more photograph. Stephen sits across the table, now resting his arms loosely around a yellow satchel holding art supplies and thank you notes from grateful recipients.

“These are love letters,” Stephen smiles.

Indeed. In more ways than one.

Stephen Humble and one of his cards called "Bug Rug"

  

Photo by Katie Oxford

Stephen Humble and one of his cards called "Bug Rug"