FLORA SCHMOOZE

Plant Life Podcast — The Travel Episode

Out and about with Ivy

Welcome to Plant Life Podcast. I’m Ivy, your host. Today my guest is Jade, and we’ll be chatting about her life as a nomadic house plant. You may know Jade from her own podcast, Leaf Gab, where she interviews other roaming botany. She speaks to us from a window in Virginia where she landed after a cross-house trip from upstairs to downstairs.

IVY: Jade, welcome.

JADE: Thanks for having me, Ivy. It’s nice to be in one place for a change and have this time to talk.

IVY: Absolutely. So, Jade, you’re a committed wanderlust. Why do you travel? What’s the draw?

JADE: That’s the fifty-thousand-dollar question. For me, it’s about not having roots. Moving around on a whim. Also, self-reliance, right? I know every time my owner moves me to the next place, I want to make it work for me.

IVY: I think most houseplants can relate. We don’t know where life will take us, but we want to blossom wherever that is. Do you give much forethought to the places you might travel?

JADE: What do you mean?

IVY: Do you cultivate a proactive mindset on potentiality?

JADE: Oh, that’s deep. [laughter] I’d say yes, I spend a huge amount of time sitting in one spot thinking about the next stop on my journey. Will I be front-and-center or out-of-sight-out-of-mind? There’s wide variation in water resources. I try not to worry, but if I do I say, Jade, you will see the light wherever you land — even if it’s indirect. Or fluorescent.

IVY: That’s inspiring. I think fear stems from that perennial mystery of the unknown. We want to know what the future holds. It’s universal.

JADE: True, but we can weed those thoughts out, too.

IVY: Excellent point. So, Jade, we’re getting a deluge of questions from our listeners here. They’re asking about some of the more unusual places you’ve visited.

JADE: Ivy, I tell you, some spots deserve a whole podcast episode.

IVY: Such as?

JADE: I once spent six months in the laundry room next to the litter box.

IVY: You’re kidding.

JADE: I wish. I was being asked to spruce up that corner a bit. It’s not a tourist destination, so I had many quiet hours to contemplate the meaning of life. With eight cats, the spray of litter kept me awake — sleep was a real issue. And it was under the heating vent, so I had a constant hot flash. I thought it was menopause.

IVY: Was it?

JADE: No. I’d just overheated. Once my owner moved me to the kitchen counter and watered me, I had children.

IVY: Do you travel with your kids?

JADE: We go everywhere together. It’s our version of van life. One of my little sprouts calls it Pot Life, which I joked about on my podcast. Then High Life Magazine asked to do a feature article on us, but I declined. Cat pee gets you plenty wasted.

IVY: Do you have a ‘Top 5’ of the places you’ve been to?

JADE: The kitchen window is my favorite. Lots of people energy. My owner likes to move plants in and out of there frequently, so you’ll meet species from all over the house. The aromas are good until they’re not. That’s life in the kitchen.

IVY: Where else?

JADE: I loved my summer trips to the patio. It’s a vacation paradise insofar as the deer consider you unpalatable. I enjoyed the bathroom shelf — so much to see.

IVY: And probably some stuff you can’t un-see, am I right?

JADE: No comment! [laughs] My time spent next to the TV was fun. You think all eyes are on you, but they’re not. Oddly, I loved living next to the teenager’s electric guitar speaker. You’d think the decibels would kill you, but they aerated my potting soil nicely.

IVY: I like to ask my guests a final question. What’s one thing you wish you could do if there were no obstacles?

JADE: You know, plants are so agreeable. We’re brought up to value conciliation. We’re staid, quiet, and mind our own business. Do you want us on the nightstand next to your gaseous aging father? We’ll do it. Do you want to exile us to the top of the fridge? No complaints from us.

IVY: But if you could do one thing.

JADE: Honestly, Ivy, I wish I could get up out of my container on my own terms, walk over to the kitchen table, sit down, and eat scrambled eggs with everyone else. Just once.

IVY: Eating scrambled eggs tops your bucket list? Most plants I pose that question to want to travel to the ISS as an experiment, or lounge for a week in Cabo. Racing at NASCAR is common. Nobody’s ever mentioned scrambled eggs.

JADE: I’ve seen so much of the world, Ivy. Upstairs, downstairs, back patio. I’ve had a big life by any standard. Eating eggs is predicated on the fact there are legs to walk you over to the stool and sit you down. Something like that is a beautiful fantasy to me.

IVY: Sprouting legs might be a lot to ask of the Universe, but I know scientists are working hard on CRISPR right now. Maybe you’ll be walking around the kitchen sooner than you think! Jade, it’s been a delight having you with us today. Thanks so much for joining me on Plant Life. Come back again, will you?

JADE: Any time, Ivy. Now, how do I get back over to the window?

IVY: Sit tight. It might take a while.

Thanks for listening to Plant Life Podcast. I’m Ivy, your host. Next week we’ll talk to Bud, a dandelion who is representing weeds in a class action against Monsanto. Drop us a line and let us know how we’re doing. Be well!

Thanks to T. Kent Jones for his generous editing. He helped with both the verbiage and the herbage.

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