Withholding Water

My jade plant is blooming its white bright starry flowers. I didn't even know jade plants could bloom until just a few years ago. Withhold water for a couple of months in September and October (or water very, very lightly), and voila! Flowers!

I'm just re-doing my advance directives for the event when i am unable to make my own health care decisions. I am choosing to have food and water withheld. Several years ago, a nurse pointed out that tubes in means tubes out. I don't like the sound of that.

Withholding food and water from my mother when she was dying was one of the hardest things i've ever done, yet she was choking on a tiny spoonful of tapioca and choking on a half-teaspoon of water. It was time to stop.

The night before she died, i dreamed she had a crown of white flowers in her hair, very like the jade's white starry flowers.

The houseplants came indoors yesterday after a good long summer recess of more than 4 months.

The Dieffenbachia looks great. The banana tree is nearly 6 feet tall.

I had to make some hard decisions. There's just not enough room in my jam-packed solarium for the 4-foot tall jade plant. I'm sending it off to the Plant Sale on Saturday. But first, i sawed off a side shoot, which was 18 inches tall; i'm keeping that little(r) plant.

The bird-of-paradise, which blooms when it is pot-bound, busted out of its pot this summer. I divided it into 4 pots, one of which i'll keep.

Change. Change of season. Change of plants. Change of plans--the re-potting took longer than expected.

All around us, life is in a constant flux of change. Although we don't notice it, we, too, are constantly changing. You've already changed your clothes and changed your mind about something (maybe about the clothes you're wearing :). Breath has changed; blood has changed; bodily fluids have changed--some of been eliminated, some have been added. I'm drinking tea as i write this.

Summer vacation is well and truly over. Some day, the summer of our life will drift away.
Welcome fall.

Photo from www.flowerinfo.com

Little White Stars

My jade plant is blooming with little white stars. While this may not be unusual for people (and jade plants) living in zone 9 or 10, my jade plant and i live in zone 5. I didn't even know that a jade plant could bloom indoors until i accidentally discovered the secret: Withhold water in September and October and the jade will bloom in November.

Actually, i don't have the heart to totally withhold water, so i water very, very lightly, just a couple of tablespoons of water once or twice a week.

Renunciation can make us bloom too. It's counter-intuitive. By giving up something, we will have more time, more energy, and quite possibly, more calm. In this season of buying more (buying more than we can really afford?), what would you be willing to give up? One trip to the store? Overeating at one meal? Turning off the computer an hour or two before bedtime?

Let me know what you can renounce with an open heart.

Let's go outdoors and watch the stars shine in the night sky.

Jade Stars

My 25-year-old jade plant is flowering for the very first time. Sprays of small white stars hovering over the succulent leaves surprised me when i returned home in early December from a month-long retreat.

A Master Gardener friend tells me her jade plant flowers every year. After summer vacation, Alice, a teacher and a mother, puts her plants in the garage and then brings them indoors in October.

The comparing mind could start chewing on this. "If Alice can do it, and i can't, therefore something is wrong with me." Is that really logical?

Alice's jade plant blooms. Mine usually doesn't.

A jade plant blooms under the right conditions: withhold water around the time of the first frost (in October), keep it cool, then resume very light watering. If like me, you water your jade plant regularly, then it won't bloom. This year, however, the jade plant went unwatered as i was rushing around preparing for my month-long retreat. When i returned home in early December, the jade plant was blooming.

And after four weeks of withholding myself from contact with the world, so was i.