On pandemic plants

First off, it’s been a long while. Life picks up and changes speed in different ways, habits evolve, platforms fall out of use, and suddenly you realize you’re not at all where you last were when you were writing blog posts on WordPress. It feels like this platform belongs to a different time, not formatted for narrow-screen scrolling but rather for whole-page browsing. I like it.

We’re entering year 2 of the pandemic (the first pandemic? will I need to specify that for future readers, for my future self stumbling upon this in 5 years?) and like so many others, the first year was full of novelty. I upped my sourdough game, made gallons of kombucha, and, now a homeowner with a little dirt-and-mud plot of backyard, got really, really into plants.

Some of the plants in my pandemic collection

None of this is profound, or particularly special. But I never turn down an opportunity for thoughtful reflection when it so clearly presents itself, and my journey from “try to keep this hardware-store pothos alive” to “reclaiming rainwater for my 80+ tropical houseplants” has been full of moments worthy of pause. (I have to add — I know 80 houseplants sounds like a lot but it’s amazing how it’s really not that excessive. This could be just the beginning. That alone is a bit frightening…)

The thing I want to think about is how much grace we give plants, grace that we don’t offer to ourselves.

When I get a new plant, it’s often in the form of a cutting. A few mature leaves and maybe a new bud, a node with an emergent root or the hope thereof, sitting in a wet paper towel. This cutting used to be part of a thriving plant, a mere appendage among the many of a rich, lush organism, and now here it is, severed and limp on my kitchen table. This cutting has suddenly transformed from wispy auxiliary tendril to “mother plant,” and has the power to put out roots, to grow into its own lush and thriving being, but for now is just barely holding onto life, sustained by a glass of water and some sun.

Given time, the cutting will grow those roots, and I will move it to some substrate — soil, nutrients, a vessel to hold it. Out of the water, it will need tending. Water at the right times, not too much. Some light, but of the right intensity, the right duration. Fertilizer sometimes, but never in winter. There are rules, superstitions, rituals for tending these silent beings we’ve brought inside our walls, and we observe to see if we’re getting it right. A trace of yellow — did I water too much? A shrivelled leaf — is the air too dry? A brown spot — are there pests? Is the light too bright? And each plant responds a tiny bit differently. Two cuttings, cut the same day, rooted at the same time, planted in the same pot; one thrives, the other wilts. Who can say why?

And we talk about shock. When you bring a new plant home, expect it to struggle at first. Even if you’ve given it a perfectly-planned home, it’s a new space and your plant may drop a few leaves in protest. Move it to a new, better pot and it may object to its roots being disrupted. Even if the old pot was causing problems, the plant still clings to the way things were and mourns its old home before thriving in its new one. And sometimes you need to move the plant around a bit, searching for the right spot. Warm enough, bright enough. I swear some of my plants have befriended each other and only really thrive when in the other’s company.

I have one plant that has lived in my house for 5 months and has not grown a single new leaf. It sits, resolutely, in its spot, and waits, perhaps for spring to come, with its warm sunshine. And yet the two cuttings I took from that plant, grown from some damaged leaves I pruned on its arrival, have put out new roots, and shoots, and leaves galore. The parent plant is biding its time. Maybe it needs something I haven’t been able to give it yet. But these cuttings were ready to create a new life.

When a plant fails to thrive, we don’t blame the plant. We try to understand it, and what circumstances are affecting it. We move it around the room, looking for the perfect spot that will make it happy. We buy clip-on lights and different soils, we melt down buckets of snow to give it fresh water. We give it time, quelling our impatience and desire for instant results. And we try to give it every opportunity to reach its full potential. And if it doesn’t — if it never flowers, or can’t stop dropping leaves, or shrivels under our care — we don’t get frustrated at the plant for not trying harder. That’s not to say we don’t get frustrated, and maybe we even blame the plant, or let it die. But underneath that superficial annoyance, we don’t attribute the cause of failure to the plant just not pulling itself up by its bootstraps properly. We recognize that some plants need more than we can give it, or different conditions than we have, and we embrace that.

I wonder what it would be like to truly extend that same grace, compassion, and care to people. To ourselves. Are we really in the right pot for us? Do we need some time to get over the shock of some change? Have we dropped a few leaves lately, and is there some small, incremental shift that would help us feel less shrivelled, give us more of what we need more of, or less of what there is too much of?

I think about how long it took me to feel “settled” in Montreal. How many moves, how many apartments. How disruptive each one was, even if it was an overall improvement. How sometimes change is necessary — in work, in friends, in relationships, in living space, in hobbies, in habits, in everything — to try to get closer to an environment, a life, that facilitates thriving. And maybe there isn’t one perfect windowsill for us to sit in our whole lives, maybe we outgrow one pot, then the next, or need more light or warmth some seasons of our life than others.

All I know is that I am far more patient with my houseplants than with myself, and maybe that’s something worth changing.

Glossolalia

A wordy, personal meditation on language, communication, music, and a circuitous path home.

Taking root

Moving to Montreal was stressful for me, and the ways that stress manifested itself surprised me. For example, I became extremely concerned about the moment of border crossing, when I’d be coming to Canada as a “visitor,” bringing with my all my worldly possessions. I wasn’t doing anything illegal, but on a 6-month visitor visa, you’re not supposed to be coming to settle permanently. That’s what permanent residency is for. Which I’ve applied for, and am waiting on. Meanwhile, I’m “visiting.” Visiting for 8 weeks at a time, as I keep heading back to Cambridge to get prescription refills and meet with my advisor. Indefinitely “visiting.”

In any case, this was stressful enough to figure out a way to cross the border with Jean-Luc separately from the moving van, so it would look less strange to say I was “visiting.” A friend drove us up the day before, and we went through with her carload of things, while Jonathan and his family stayed another night in Cambridge to finish packing up the truck, and to leave at the crack of dawn for the long haul.

This was also stressful enough to make me worry about bringing contraband across the border. Alcohol is strictly limited to 1.14 liters per person, so I gave away all of my booze to my knit night (you’re welcome, guys). Soil is forbidden, so I threw away my bag of potting soil. Unless you get an expensive phytosanitary certificate from the government, the only plants allowed are cut flowers not intended for propagation, so I gave away my houseplants, even the one made from cutting of my great-grandmother’s christmas cactus.

And what I’m about to say is entirely hypothetical, and does not have any bearing on me…

…but if one were particularly attached to your houseplants, one might be able to bring cuttings in a small bag in one’s backpack, and start rooting them in a different country.

And if one were to do such a thing, and if the plants were particularly hardy and eager to grow, they might take root in this new country with striking speed and ease, making their owner, feeling a bit uprooted herself, both envious and optimistic.

I guess you just need to want to grow.