The Handmaid's Tale Ten

"I look at the one red smile. The red of the smile is the same as the red of the tulips in Serena Joy's garden, towards the base of the flowers where they are beginning to heal. The red is the same but there is no connection." (33)

The smile is that of an unknown man with a white sack over his head that has recently been hung. The connection is made that the color is that of the flowers that Serena Joy tirelessly tends to in her garden. "The base of the flowers where they are beginning to heal" is a part of the tulips that have been mentioned at another point in the book by Atwood, thus the Handmaid's menstrual cycle has been once completed. As for "Serena Joy's garden," a garden is often times a slang term for a woman's reproductive organs, which hers wear a sad grin for lack of activity. In fact, the difference between her garden and the Handmaid's is that she has no way to connect with the Commander, or to present him with a child. Nonetheless, Offred sees her on many occasions throughout the book, tending to her garden, and especially to her tulips.