House Plants

As I thought about how to structure My Year of Plants, I realized that I needed some ground rules, pun intended. I considered it the equivalent of the mission statement that companies painstakingly hash out over day(s)-long retreat, followed by guidelines meant to keep me focused on the task at hand. All of this would hopefully maximize learning if not success on each month’s topic. I understood that this may be a work-in-progress, but, nonetheless, in the interest of having some thoughts on paper from the very beginning…

“My Year of Plants” Mission Statement: To investigate all aspects of one plant-based topic monthly, focusing on the improvement of health and an increase of knowledge, skills and connection to plants.

Particulars:
1) One topic per month
2) Emphasize science with practical, easy-to-implement offshoots relevant to our daily lives
3) Provide references for further reading or learning
4) Spend less than $100 monthly in supplies, books, materials relevant to that month’s topic; this needs to be affordable and reasonable for the general population
5) Walk the talk: really work to make that plant topic a part of my life, and share the results. Hopefully this information and experience will help others to do the same and save my readers from having to “reinvent the wheel.”
6) Add media, in the form of video and pictures and links to the internet whenever possible to foster learning and, well, entertainment. This, after all, should be fun to be sustainable in our lives!

With this framework established, let’s launch into January’s topic: HOUSE PLANTS.

The context of this month’s topic is that I had just moved into a new condominium in Madison, WI, and was facing a winter of drab, white snowscape, sans anything green. I wanted that to change. In addition, as you learned in the introductory blog posting, 2011 was the year when I watched the last of my un-killable cacti die a slow, rotting death in the small, cute blue ceramic pot I had received from someone likely trying their best to “liven” up my place with a little bit of greenery.

Shortly after the thought of increasing the number of my house plants from “zero” to “something other than zero,” I passed off laudatory comments to a friend about his thriving indoor garden, which led to the generous gift of several starts, including pieces of jade that would “grow simply by placing it on moist soil” and some unnamed plant that is “taking over the southwest” because it is so precocious.

I transported home these plant pieces in folded paper and geared up for the big planting the following day. But, what to plant them in? My friend had some opinions about soil type, but he seemed flexible about that variable in the description of his house plant success. I would see if I could get something free from nature or, more likely, a family member. Heck, as much as it takes a community to raise a child, perhaps the same would be said for our plants and their role in our lives. I would look around for help from the very beginning.

The bottom line is that donations poured in, providing me with pots and potting soil, and the resulting triad of soon-to-be-jungle botanical starts pictured here. This, I realized, was only the beginning. With the foundation in place, now the real work would begin. Let’s assume I am able to let most of my plants grow, thrive, and achieve their potential as the evolutionary success stories that they are, the more compelling questions to be answered centered around the types of plants that were “best” for us and our indoor dwellings. As a physician, I am most interested in health and healing, so are there some plants better for us, healthier for us, more suited for us to look at, live near, and, yes, well, eat or smell?

These questions and more will be percolating in my mind, and hopefully yours, as I launch into the next month’s topic. Stay tuned to this blog for relevant updates and future musings!