I have a habit of labelling my plants. Part of the reason is whenever my little nephew comes over on the weekend, it's a lesson in pronouncing the names of the plants and letting him taste and smell the herbs. He no longer eats the herbs but his eyes always open in wonder whenever he smells the rosemary and the basil. He grew and smarten up. No longer duped into eating the herbs but I will always remember the conversations we have about the herbs.
"Ah Yi, I can eat them?"
"Yes. Does it smell nice?"
Boy nods and chews quietly.
"Is it nice?"
"Not nice", and he promptly spits them out.
Back to my plants, I label them and at the same time, I keep a graveyard of my plant casualties. Some died of poor nutrition and neglect. Others, because of my holidays. Another factor was my gradual shift from a brightly sunlit balcony garden to a shadier one because of the two biggish murrayas that I have. The sun-loving flowering periwinkles and lantanas are gone and in their place are the basil and the rosemary. The hibiscus is still alive but is growing leaves most of the time.
Let's see. What happened?
Periwinkle
Grown from seeds to a mature plant. Died because of lack of sunlight and neglect. I didn't like them anymore.
Mint
They were around from a long time. Died while I was trying to kill the ants nesting in the soil. Pesticides and overwatering. Honestly, I was just trying to drown the ants.
Chilli
I had a few harvests from this plant. Really spicy chilli padi. Died because of my carelessness. I forgotten to attach the self-watering system to the plant. Damn stupid reason to die. Came back from hols....dead.
Lantanas
Died because I didn't like them....nuff said. I am evil.
The one that came with the wind
It popped out of nowhere. Grew happily amongst the palms. Came one day, gone a year later. Overwatering.
The new kid on the block, Lipstick plant
Bought two, one left. Struggling to survive.
Do I have green fingers? Not really...Lessons learnt everyday.
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