By Tashmica Torok
I will be the first to admit that when it comes to the fine art of house wivery, I kind of suck.
Yes, I am aware that my vocabulary should provide me another way to describe that but this word choice is pretty accurate.
I have no schedule for cleaning, I forget things on my calender simply by not checking it, and dinners are always prepared just in time for us to have to leave for a scheduled event with an empty stomach and a pocket full of cereal bars. I fall short. I try and I am baffled. I thought that I had discovered one way to beat the domestic system. House plants.
I am not talking lush palms or rhododendrons. There are no lemon trees or ferns on my porch either. I only buy cacti for my home. This affinity for spiky plants is partially a salute to my hometown *clap clap clap clap* deep in the heart of Texas! It is also partially a salute to my inability to keep anything alive that needs more attention than a desert succulent.
Imagine my dismay when I looked over and saw a droopy cactus arm.
I have managed to nearly kill a plant that could potentially withstand the harshness of Death Valley. A plant that needs very little of the TLC that other plants demand. I feel like I stole candy from a baby. I feel like I just tripped an old lady using a cane. This poor plant.
I give up. This weekend, I will take my damaged cacti (I have two that are dying) over to my mother-in-law’s home where plants go to be pampered, named and sunned on the porch. I am going to dust myself off and recognize that indoor plants are not for me.
I will stick with what I have said for years. If God cannot care for them, then they will die. That is why the plants in my yard that are solidly embedded in the ground are lush and happy. Those plants in pots appear to be begging me to just let them go into the light.
And if I get sad at the thought of admitting failure in yet another column of the domestic diva arts, I will look past the empty spot left by my cacti sent to foster care to the trim that frames the wall.
You see I have lines notched into the trim on my wall. Those are lines for each of my children and how they have grown over the years.
Plants?
No, plants are not safe in my care but children…… I grow like a flippin’ pro!
Tashmica Torok is a local entrepreneur, blogger and community activist. Her blog, The Mother Flippin’: One Funny Mother is about encouraging women to improve the world through thoughtful, honest parenting, responsible business practices and advocacy for those less fortunate.
And laughter…loads of laughter!
To read more visit: http://mother-flippin.blogspot.com/ You can also “like” The Mother Flippin Fan Page at http://facebook.com/mother-flippin and follow Tashmica @Mother_Flippin on Twitter.
This was printed in the April 24, 2011 – May 7, 2011 edition.
