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Thinking Plants

I love houseplants but have very few of them given how the work involved in keeping them all alive grows exponentially with how much life and beauty they bring into the space. There is certain divine fairness to that equation but one that does not serve me well specially when I am away for several weeks a at time. My friend M gifted me an orchid plant several months ago and I had managed to keep just about all the flowers alive for the whole time feeding it ice-cubes weekly. When I returned from vacation there was not a single flower left though the leaves remained healthy and green. The idea of plant straws is great and logically it might even work. I need to experiment with a home-made version of the thing to see it deliver in practice. A bit of thin PVC tubing should in theory serve the same purpose as the brass straw. 

Thinking of houseplants and my somewhat theoretical love of them always brings T to mind. I worked with her some years ago. She lived in a condo in Chicago at the time and when you walked through the front door it was as if you had stepped into a tropical rain-forest. The place was teeming with houseplants of all shapes and sizes. T traveled a fair bit and had elaborate mechanisms to keep her plants thriving while she was out. Some of those plants were over a decade old - they were acquired when T first moved to America from Spain. Keeping them alive and well had symbolic importance to her. That was a love of plants manifested in a tangible way. T was that kind of person - she did not just imagine the life she would like or love, she took steps to make it happen. 

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