August 18, 2005
Plant Killer
Jill Brooks, INtake columnist

Domesticity should be based on a sliding scale. I am good in house cleaning departments, but cannot keep plants alive. I’ve been particularly horrified after killing the species everyone brands “indestructible.”

I was forced to give up ownership when, after many attempts, I saw how plants suffered in my presence. Currently, there is very little oxygen where I live.

Houseplants always looked thirsty and cold to me, and though I never abandoned them (okay, maybe a few times when I went on vacation), I tended to over-water them just before sticking them in direct sunlight.

I nurtured plants, but within weeks of being under my care their withered little leaves (the ones remaining) looked like they’d been dipped in rusty ink. I’d say, “I didn’t mean to kill you” while carrying them to their final resting place, the dumpster.

My slam dunk shot at responsibility was my “lucky” bamboo plant. I purchased it in Chinatown in Los Angeles two years ago, and carried it home on the plane. I kept it safe in a bag at my feet, a bag that would never be stowed in an overhead compartment, or stuffed in the space in front of me. Watchfully, I checked on it several times, as if I were carrying home a butterfly.

A girlfriend came over a few days after my return. When I showed off my new purchase, my California “find,” she said, “You carried that all the way from L.A.? You can buy them at a kiosk at Castleton Mall.”

Hmm, live and learn.

Gently, I cared for it like an egg in a tossing contest. It even gulped down the excessive water.

But as good luck waved its fond farewell, the bamboo’s leaves began turning brown too. One day I came home to a dead, empty stalk. I wondered how I could ever possibly care for children; I wondered how bamboo tasted dipped in hummus.

I decided to give luck one more chance in my life. I searched all over town (two places, actually) for a new bamboo plant, finding one at Lowe’s. It was too thick and heavy for my existing planter, so I cut it in half with a butter knife.

The top part, the pretty part with leaves, had to be discarded (dumpster revisited); the bottom part, the important part with roots, I stuck in the planter.

Now again, I have an empty, characterless stalk soaking in water.

I am unworthy of horticulture, hereby relinquishing anything living (or dead) and green.