My Thumb is Turning Green

One of my summer jobs in college was working in the indoor plant department of a gardening store. Despite 6 months of taking care of houseplants 40 hours a week, my own plants scare me. I'm constantly afraid that they're going to die. I can deal with them better en masse. 30 african violets are no problem. But if there's only one, I tend to hover over it and practically kill it with kindness. I do much better with plants that need a lot of water. So at the end of my time at this store, I used my employee discount to acquire a small espresso plant. It even had a bean growing on it. For almost 3 years I watered and misted it faithfully, and it was doing quite well, although no more beans appeared. Then I did something really stupid, although my intentions were good. I decided to take my plants with me when I went to stay at my parents' house for the Christmas break. I was going to be there for almost 2 weeks, and I didn't want my hitherto successful plants to wither away without me. So early one Sunday morning, I bundled them into my car and headed back to my hometown. I decided to meet my parents at church rather than go straight home.

This is the part where I kick myself. Because I left my poor little tropical plant in my car in the middle of winter for 2 hours. It looked fine when I brought it inside, but by that evening most of the leaves had turned brown and shriveled up. Half of them were on the floor. But there were a few green ones still clinging to the stem, so I started misting furiously, hoping to save my baby. By the end of vacation it hadn't gotten better, but it hadn't gotten any worse, either. And since I couldn't find another one to replace it, I took my espresso plant back home with me. And so it has sat, on a table in my room. I remember to water it when I feed the others, although I've been really bad about the misting. 6 months later, I still haven't been able to find a replacement, which is the only reason it's still around.

But last week, a miracle occured! There are a few baby leaves starting to poke out of the stem. My plant lives! There are still a lot of brown or half brown leaves that refuse to fall off, so it looks pretty sad, but this gives me hope. Now I really can't give up on it. So maybe in a few years I'll be able to invite someone over for a teaspoon of coffee or a chocolate covered espresso bean.