Sunday, May 17, 2015

Spidey Sense

"Do you have any dirt?" a student asked me the other morning.

"As it happens, I do," I answered him. "Why do you ask?"

"That plant over there on the window has crazy roots," he told me. "Can we pleeeeease plant it?"

I knew what he was talking about. Last spring my friend Mary gave me a little vase full of spider plant babies. "Just put it on your window sill," she said, "and transplant it later." I followed her directions and in June, I took my little fledgling plant home and put out on the deck. What an awesome summer it had! The lush, flourishing spider plant I brought back in August was amazing, and it wasn't long before it was flowering and producing tiny offspring of its own. I rooted and planted the first brood (hence the potting soil in my cabinet), and it was the second round of descendants that were basking in the sunlight in a tall glass of water as we spoke.

"Sure," I said, "but I don't have a pot right now. How about if I get one over the weekend, and you help me plant it on Monday?"

He smiled and literally clapped his hands.

"Do you want take it home when we're through?" I asked.

"Can I?" he said.

"I don't see why not," I said. "Ask your parents if it's okay."

He walked away quite pleased, but a few minutes later he was back. "There's just one more thing," he said quite gravely. "You're going to have to teach me how to take care of it. I've never had a plant before."

"I will," I told him. "I will."

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