A daft Hatian was the orchid theif
Sorry for the title…it’s Monday.
Bachman’s sold my girlfriend an orchid for ten dollars, and she left it in my care. That’s like trading a BMX for a BMW, and then letting your golden retriever drive it home.
The orchid has a tall and wobbly stem; it can’t stand on its own, so it’s twisty-tied to a stick. At the end of the stem are three stunning, delicate, utterly useless flowers. Unlike, say, magnolias or daisies, which are blue-collar flowers, orchids look like they would faint if a humble bumblebee alighted on them. It’s even got a prissy name: “Newberry Parfait Picotee”.
I’ll admit orchids are very, very pretty, but they remind me a little of Popeye’s dainty dame, Olive Oyl . Except that Olive Oyl didn’t have three heads and twelve twisted legs.
But whatever, in my book girls are like flowers; boys are like trees. Flowering trees are, well, you know…
So, the ten-dollar orchid is a girl; kind of a cheap girl, but still very feminine. And though she’s only been here for a day, I’m certain she’s going to die. That’s not a threat; I’m going to do what I can to keep her alive, but the odds are against her.
To begin with, I don’t know what kind of light she needs. The plant came with two tags, both of which have very different advice about not killing it. One says bright, direct, sunlight – a south or west-facing window – is best. The other says to NEVER, EVER, expose this plant to direct sunlight.
So it either needs direct or indirect light, but not both. I’ve been trying to think of what the middle ground is between direct and indirect light, but I started getting dizzy. And my ears wilted.
So I put the plant in a south window but turned the flowers away from the light. Already they’ve started turning back toward it, so I can see this is going to become a bit of a struggle.
The other thing is that the orchid doesn’t fit in very well. She’s got some rough company; two philodendrons (no flowers) and a cactus (flowers, but not very friendly). The orchid is four times taller than the other plants, and much prettier.
I wouldn’t be surprised if I came home from work one day to find that long, slender stem slumped against the radiator, and the cactus holding a scissors behind its back with a “who, me?” look on his face.
I’ve heard some orchids are edible (they taste like lettuce, apparently), but not this one. One of the tags says very plainly, “Not for human consumption, for decorative purposes only.” Kind of a pointless warning, if you ask me, since I doubt many people run half-starved to Bachman’s to pay ten dollars for three ounces of pink lettuce.
But then again, people pay a lot more than that for stranger things.
Have no fear though; I tied up the cactus with the philodendron and put the scissors in a different room. The little Picotee is not in danger.
That is, as long as we don’t run out of lettuce.