Bloom

When I turned 30 last year, a friend gave me an orchid, and I promptly started to panic. Lots of people say that they don’t have a green thumb, but I’m special. Not to alarm the plant-lovers out there, but I once managed to kill a miniature cactus (you know, the things that survive in unforgiving arid regions?), so I think it’s fair to say that I have a unique talent when it comes to helping houseplants cross over to the other side.

Now, I have been entrusted with an orchid before. A couple of years ago, a former boyfriend sent me one as a birthday gift while he was away for work. I pampered it, I gave it Woolworths orchid food, and I checked in on it obsessively. My approach with that boyfriend was eerily similar. I worried and worked and white-knuckled my way through that relationship, following made-up care instructions and meeting imagined needs. Unsurprisingly, the orchid and the relationship both died untimely deaths, much like Kate Hudson’s love fern in How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days.

This orchid was different. Sure, I started out on a similar path, religiously giving it an exact amount of water at exactly the same time each week; but then depression crossed my path and my priorities changed. At that point, it was a battle just to keep myself hydrated and semi-healthy, so when it came to watering the orchid, my efforts were sporadic at best. My only regular weekly appointment was with my psychologist, which is also where my money was being invested, rather than in plant food (sorry, Woolies).  

I had given up on the orchid blooming, but didn’t really have the heart or energy to get rid of it, when a friend pointed out to me that it was showing signs of blooming again this year. By then, I had started giving it (and myself) water more regularly again. I made the very un-Ansunette choice to ease up on the control, and simply gave the orchid what it seemed to need most, when it needed it: water once a week and a nice big window with soft sunlight. I don’t check in on how it seems to be doing it every day, opting instead to curiously observe what is happening with it. It sits on my dresser, and it’s the first thing I see when I open my eyes in the morning. That sight used to prompt me to check in on the plant, and try to decipher how I could move along its “progress”. Now, I simply see something beautiful that is growing at its own pace, a process that I have the privilege of witnessing.

We so often compare our inner worlds, our relationships, and our careers to gardens. We casually drop phrases like “nurture” and “tending to” when discussing them. My poor gardening skills let me down here on all fronts. My understanding was that it was a one-sided process, while it was actually an interaction. Yes, this orchid needed me to give it water – but it also has resilience built in, a sacred natural intelligence that I have no part in. When I slip up, when I have a bad day and forget to water it, it doesn’t rebel and die. It taps into its own reserves, waiting patiently for me to return. It doesn’t expect me to only give of myself. Healthy bodies, minds, and souls are like that too, I think. If we just give ourselves space to breathe, our body tells us what is missing and what it needs. Like that first orchid, I have suffocated myself by trying to control everything. I have gripped relationships so tightly that I walked away from them with bloody, calloused hands. To nurture a relationship doesn’t mean I steer it and meet needs that aren’t even there. It means that I should enter into interactions with open hands, being willing to give, all the while knowing that growth is not my sole responsibility. It means I should be willing to let something grow in its own way, and that even if that doesn’t align with my expectations, it can still be beautiful.

Little buds have been forming on my orchid for a while now. Sometimes, I’ve wondered when and if I’d see flowers, but I’ve decided to trust the process – for my orchid, and for my life.

Last night, after a particularly difficult week, I saw it.

My orchid is in bloom.