Too Much Thyme On My Hands

It started off innocently enough... 

It was January 2020. I was feeling in a bit of a slump, so decided to spruce up / redecorate my desk at work. This included some brief research into fluorescent light tolerant plants, some pink cloud screen-prints, a Roger Sterling Funko, and several hidden Baby Yodas. The viney pothos I had inherited from a former coworker (and had delivered a slow death to) was replaced by a couple of spry ZZs and a pretty leafy thing that I was sure would bring me happiness and deliver additional productivity (spoiler alert: it is no longer with us). My black thumb and I knew we needed more greenery to make that cube life seem more exotic. It all looked so lovely.

Fast-forward to mid-March, after hours, as I haphazardly ripped out my monitor cords, threw my keyboard, mouse, and various electronics into a backpack, and scooped those green girls into my arms in a mad dash out to my car. The post-apocalyptic landscape of the cubicle jungle was eerily quiet, with miscellaneous cords snaking about half-cleared countertops. Half eaten snacks and partially drank cups of water still sitting, frozen in time. A gym bag still hanging from the hook. A sweater over the back of a chair. Two weeks of working from home was the edict. Just a precaution. No need to grab your things. We'd be back soon. 

I knew that was a fool's hope. I took everything I could carry and ran with it. Leaving a little trail of potted soil as I went. 

And suddenly in was May. Two weeks had turned into two months, and the latest from corporate was "mid-September" - which meant another four months on the horizon. Working from home had come with several perks, of course. Rolling out of bed mere minutes before my 7:30am calls. Being able to slowly become human / dress as a person as the day progressed instead of before leaving for a commute, a commute which no longer existed. Instead of spending any spare moments between meetings chit chatting with coworkers, one could pop in laundry. Instead of preparing an easily microwaveable lunch, one could bust out a pot on the stove. All those little perks were certainly there. But one can't ignore that confining an extrovert into a two-bedroom apartment all day, every day, with little separation between work space and living space, well... it's bound to come to a head at some point. 

As that cracking point loomed, I looked up ways to make a space less stressful, to add layers of joy, to brighten one's day. And time after time, the lists highlighted one constant: light and greenery. Light we had in buckets, but greenery was lacking. In addition to the desk ones I'd brought home, we had an inherited (giant) snake plant (which was half burned from having fallen on the radiator), an oxalis that I had been gifted after my short stint as a  middle school librarian (and had somehow kept alive for years), a few half dead bookshelf pothos, an overgrown succulent, and a stray cactus or two. We weren't plantless, we had about six living non-human things, but we certainly were no oasis. So, I decided to start my indoor landscaping journey.

With a mandate to use up vacation time, I found myself with many many half days in May and June. Being afraid to interact with the general public, I instead took drives to various gardening shops and nurseries where I could mask-up and explore options outside, or get curbside pickup. Each time, just quickly grabbing one or two plants that I had researched (and assumed I could keep alive) and dashing back home. After adding the first few, it occurred to me... my husband didn't realize I was welcoming new green guests to the apartment...*

It was the day he proclaimed, "Oh, I see you moved your office plant into the bathroom. It looks nice. Bet you thought I wouldn't notice!" with a note of pride in his voice that I knew. As I glance into the bathroom at the completely different variety of leaf, in a completely different pot, and gave him a kind "well done, you!" smile, I knew. And the game was officially afoot: how many plants could I bring in to the apartment before he began to notice? The answer: a lot. SO many. Maybe too many. This went on for months. It wasn't until three months after that day that he officially began to suspect and I finally confessed. 

Would it be shady to say that my sneaky plant routine got me through? That it brought my isolated-soul massive amounts of entertainment?** That this greenery game was sadly one of the highlight adventures of my year? Maybe. Probably. But regardless, I felt like I won. I somehow incorporated twenty or so leafy friends into the various nooks of our thousand square foot apartment before the game ended in August. And I certainly didn't stop expanding from there - our total tally upon moving*** in November was up to 43 greenies. And she's still growing, our little plant fam. 

Perhaps my want to add little pots of calm got a smidge out of hand over the months. Maybe one shouldn't simply buy a new bit of foliage every time they reach a tipping point. It's possible that flora isn't the only way to bring joy to a space. But all I know is, these plants have given me something to care for, on those days when I was too exhausted and worn out by the year to want to care for myself. They unfurled new leaves when it was time to push out the old. They wilted when they needed attention, reminding me that it's okay to communicate your needs. They adapted. Together we kept hydrated, we leaned towards the light, we breathed, and we continued to grow. They made 2020 succ a little less. 

Did you really think I wouldn't get a photo shoot with them? 
This pandemic is also sponsored by disco balls and Freddie Mercury.

* While he is an extremely intelligent man, well-learned and witty, his observation skills and awareness of his surroundings are sometimes laughabley bad. We once were at a stoplight, windows down on a summer evening, just chatting, no loud music on or anything. And the person in the car right next to us recognized my then-boyfriend. They rolled down their window and were yelling his name and waving at him. This happened for at least a full minute before I was finally like, "Um, are you literally not hearing/seeing this, I think they're trying to get your attention." And he literally had ZERO awareness that they were there. He often misses people saying hello. Doesn't always notice when I've added furniture or artwork, or rearranged things, etc. His brain is just preoccupied somewhere outside the corporal space of the here and now. Bless his heart.

** Like the time I could only get a later curbside pickup timeslot, so had to physically run down an alley, my arms full of green, to avoid being seen by my husband as he was arriving home from work - and then secretly repotted said plants in the second bathroom tub later that night. Or the time I brought home a comically large leafy monster and put it in a really obvious space and just stared wide-eyed at my husband for several days like, "SURELY you see it?!"

***Oh yeah, we bought a house. In case you didn't gather from the above, being trapped in a small space by myself all the time lead to me demanded more space. Because in 2020, a gal deserves a larger cage!