And now, to my story. Blogger Me commented that her family has hosta plants that have been passed down through the generations. My mother had a philodendron plant that grew for years in the downstairs bathroom. It never looked all that healthy, but it lived. When she died, I took a cutting of the plant and put it in a vase of water to root. I meant, of course, to plant it.
Twenty three years later, the original plant had died, but that cutting still lived in water on my windowsill. We had moved a couple of times, and it always survived the move. All I did was change the water every few years.
It had gotten down to about two leaves, and I asked my youngest daughter, who has a green thumb, if she would plant it in dirt for me. I was afraid to do it, because the darn thing could have gone into shock after all those years of being hydroponic.
A few months later, she brought me two pots of the plant, both flourishing. I kept one and took the other to my dad. He was so happy! He said that he had really mourned when the plant at his house had died, because it was the only thing in the house still living from the time my mom had been alive.
In spite of our best efforts to the contrary, it lived for me to tell this story. "They" may be right: you can't kill a philodendron.
2 comments:
That's so cool. It's amazing how tenacious plants can be.
It's always interesting for me to hear about these tender and loving sides of G.D-- not much like my experience of him, but increasing these days, it seems.
Yep, Pretty, he's mellowed. Even to us. But there always was a soft side of him, and he's one of the people I try to understand by thinking of him as a young boy, losing his dad at 13, and having a mother like you-know-who. It could not have been easy.
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