So, I thought of her, and I was like, well, okay, maybe plants are the thing that I'm going to try. And so, I bought one plant, and I still have that plant to this day—it was the Marble Queen Pothos. She is one of my longest plants. She's a vine plant, and she started growing, and it's so simple, but it feels so good. I was like, let’s get into this! I started going to a bunch of different plant shops. I would hop on my bike and I would have dates with myself. I would go to these plant shops and research plants and it was an opportunity for me to escape all of the other conversations I was having in life and focus on something that was just for me while still catering to my love of nurturing something. It was the best of both worlds. I was like, this is great. Like, I don't have to nurture another person, I can nurture this little green creature…
The world we're living in right now, social interaction comes with so many anxieties. So, I've been spending a lot of time indoors with my plants. In those moments, when I do experience stress or anxiety, I go to my plants. You know, obviously, I check on my friends and loved ones, but when I don't feel like talking or hopping on the phone or looking at a screen, I have 160 possibilities.
In the outdoors, especially on the trails, it's been my experience there isn't much diversity. Is that the case for the house plant community as well?
When I started on this journey, I wasn't on Instagram. I wasn't sharing my experiences on Instagram. But I found myself taking little photos like, this is the plant before repotting, and this is the plant after repotting. And someone was like, you should put this stuff on Instagram. I think a part of me wanted to put myself out there, but I felt a little intimidated. But after a while, I found myself enjoying it, and I wanted to document that. Like, I want to document my joy. As an educator, I want to share what I'm learning and things that I've benefited from because we all need to grow.