High Maintenance Plants
Philodendrons, oh how I love them. They are low maintenance, require very little attention, and flourish in a great many conditions. Being a semi-busy sort of person, I have several of these beauties. Dark green and glossy, variegated light green, and variegated dark green.
My one and only spider plant was a mutant curly thing that I didn’t much care for. When I “accidentally” left it outside after the cold rolled in, I didn’t cry too much as I watched it wither and die. Long after it died, it’s one lone baby that I transplanted began to wither as well. I gleefully tossed that ugly thing.
I have several tropical plants that I tend to take good care of. One, much like the above mentioned mutated spider plant, was left too long in the cold and began to die. I brought him in and began slowly nursing him back to health. It will be a long time before he is restored to his former glory, but there are new green shoots and signs of life. He will survive.
Alas, I am not sure I can say the same for my beloved ivy. One of my ivy plants flourishes in the dining room window. He is a small little guy, with a constant water supply and plenty of sunlight. I’ve taken great care to make sure he thrives because he is one of the best presents I’ve ever received. His big sister? Not so much.
I brought her in out of the cold and placed her lovingly in the dining room. Yours truly, being home only some of the time, thought to herself, “Oh certainly there is enough light in here. Look how well the little one does! Look how much light comes in through the sliding doors!” Yours truly is not so smart some times.
Ivy is delicate. It requires sunlight. And when you tend to leave the blinds on the sliding glass doors closed during the day when no one is home, there tends to be very little sunlight. As I watched her beautiful leaves begin to dry and fall off, I became distressed. And then, in a moment of abject stupidity, I over watered her.
All the water in the world won’t do a thing for her without the light she craves. I’ve moved her upstairs, to a nice spot under the skylight, but I fear it may be too late. Much like human hearts, once abandoned and left to its own fate without proper care, high maintenance plants are hard to bring back.
She was a beautiful, majestic site to behold once. Now she is but a shadow of her former self. Her leaves have mostly fallen off, her countenance is no longer bright; she is, in a word, dying.
She is a symbol of something much larger. And I mean to bring her back to life.