Plants, and prayers—the path to Nirvana—this is what I first heard from a favorite aunt and the edit came when ‘pets’ was inserted in between from the experiences of my family. Considering we are all hamsters running on the proverbial wheel of life that is unnecessarily complicated by an amalgamation of our egos, expectations and energy that has not been directed to the right quarters, if these three things can create a detour to Nirvana—what’s the harm?
Part I- Plants
It’s just that how many of us are born with the green thumb? Many you, say? Fine—but I am not among the many because I certainly did not inherit it from my mother. She’s a true blue Green Thumb, the kind that can coax a dry twig into a luscious tree. A terrible cyclone once split open the trunk of one of her coconut trees and defying the expert horticulturalist, who told her it was dead wood; she planted creeping plants around it. Believe it or not, the creeper’s entwining embrace, hugged the coconut tree into healing and she is rewarded even today with coconuts the size of my head. We have forever borne her nicking off a stem here and a branch there always with a nonchalant, “ Dawai ke liye (It’s for a medicine)”, like some Ayurvedic quack, if anyone in the vicinity raised a questioning eyebrow. I still fall into paroxysm of laughter imagining my mother grinding a medicine out of a croton stem and immediately sober up after imagining myself at the receiving end of that concoction. Anyway, what I really applaud is her efforts at greening my home. Considering that I live in an apartment, not only the pots but also the soil has to be bought and hauled up. She sets off to work mixing the soil and the fertilizer, planting and patting the soil back in place and I see all the plants lined up like little green gladiators looking sadly but heroically at me saying, “We who are about to die salute you!” I have kept them alive, at least most of them.
To make matters worse, I have the Green Thumbs at the workplace too. Money plants, and bamboo flourish at their desks, christened with names like Dewdrops, Buttercup, Hope etc. Their attempts at greening the rest of us is on, but I did hear this excerpt:
“I gave you a Money Plant, didn’t I?”
“Yes you did.”
“But you went and killed it”
“No, it actually committed suicide”
Yet another:
“Will you plant this Lily or not?”
“Er…yes, looks like an onion to me”
“It’s a bulb and it’s very fast at reproduction”
“So what color Lily is it?”
“Pink”
Yet another constant gardener pipes in, “Hey, I can give a white Lily too”
“Can I plant the pink and white together?”
“Yes and you will get white and pink lilies.”
“Unless they mutate into light pink”
“I already have a yellow one. What kind of lily would I get if I plant the pink, white and yellow together?”
All I got was stony stares and, “We choose to keep silent on this matter.”
Possibly I have the genes of the uncle who made an effort of planting tomato plants in the yard. Did he harvest ripe, red tomatoes? No, he mowed them down with his lawn mower when the plants were beginning to rise to face the sun. It was a genuine mistake but the intentions were heartfelt.
How then do plants take you up the path of nirvana? By focusing your attention to caring for them, by watching them survive all odds of weather, human profanity, and their own limitations just to stick out one new leaf, by learning from them the tenacity with which they take root, the foresight with which they grow into the future, the steadfastness of their purpose to flower and recreate, and ofcourse the sheer joy of their beauty.
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