The exotic sits on the table. It is surrounded by decidedly un-exotic things: a parking ticket, a brochure from Gelson’s, the remote control and a stuffed, carnival-prize banana with a cartoon smiling face (Okay, that’s somewhat exotic).
I have never had an orchid plant before. This one was a gift as a thank-you for my work with a local Topanga home-school group. I had been invited to share creation stories and Greek myths with the students and direct them in acting out the tales. We all had a pretty good time, as young teens tempted by a serpent and the pursuit of knowledge were banished from the garden and moved on east of Eden.
In later classes they transformed into Gods and Goddesses rising from the mortal world to the rare heights of Mt. Olympus, decreeing who will live and who will die while draped in shiny fabric sheets, heads adorned with wreaths and plastic crowns.
I named the plant Pandora, which means gift of the Gods. Unfortunately I, as with the original Pandora, had no practical knowledge of how to care for my gift. It seemed easy at first, the plant just sat there looking pretty and elegant on those tapering, tropical stems, and sometimes I was even inspired to clear the cluttered debris from the dining table as a tribute to her delicate beauty. I was advised to water her with an ice cube about once a week, which somehow always made me covet a martini. Then one day a flower fell.
In an attempt at horticulture, I have gone on line to research my charge and discovered I have in my care a Phalaenopsis. To be exact I have a Phalaenopsis Aphrodite or Moon Orchid. It has petals of cloud white, soft, looking like powder with a pale yellow center and etched, deep within, rather spidery looking pink streaks. As I looked closely, some of the stems from which the flowers bloom are turning brown and I fear soon all will fall, silently and softly, dropping like Pandora’s tears for having unleashed all those sorrows on our world.
A book I found at the library, The Orchid Thief, written by Susan Orlean, contains more facts and history about orchids than one would reasonably want to know and it became a national bestseller. Evidently, there is quite an orchid cult and there is danger of the unsuspecting or weak of mind to become enthralled with the plant to the point of obsession. Some plants sell for thousands of dollars and from time to time greenhouses are pillaged and accusations fly. Murders have been committed. Devotees dream of orchids, scheme to create new hybrids and long to one day see the elusive and mythical black orchid.
Not everyone likes orchids. Tennessee Williams, as a young man, compared his glimpse of a prostitute’s genitalia to that of a dying orchid, the shock of which he claimed to have never gotten over and hence remained rather frightened of the flower throughout his life. I don’t know how he got himself into such a situation, where he had no business being in the first place, for we know that Mr. Williams was not predisposed to vaginal admiration, but I like to think he must have been in an especially dark poet’s mood that day or came at it from the wrong angle. However, I see his point. Vividly.
I myself am not much of a delicate exotic. I’m more of a pumpkin, sort of round, jolly and bright. I attempt from year to year to grow the fruit in my own hardscrabble, fallen garden. Planting in the spring yielded nothing. Not one pumpkin seedling sprouted and I suspected gophers had enjoyed my efforts, as I noted little piles of dirt all over the place. Not much on persistence, I let it go. Then something came over me about two weeks ago, an obsession of sorts. Some inner voice sounded and through all the clatter and strum of daily life, I heard it clearly, “Plant pumpkins, plant pumpkins now!”
I made a special trip to find seeds. One pack left. I did the germination math and figured it would take 110 days. If I planted, right now, this very day, I could have a pumpkin for Halloween. Surveying the yard, I planned to spread out, plant everywhere; if gophers ate the seeds in one part of the yard perhaps they would leave the other part alone, (just a theory). In the fading sun, on a Topanga afternoon with tropical clouds turning color, I planted. Five sections were sown with seed. Five possible pumpkin patches. I was hopeful; I saw the future. And indeed, in just a few days little sprouts burst through that dry earth, some inner power telling them to raise their green leaves toward the sun and grow.
There are three possible culprits: gopher, snail and rabbit. Suddenly the sprouts were gone like bad magic, disappeared back into the ground, called down by the God of the Underworld to grace his halls, not mine. I guess he, Hades, makes a fourth suspect and formidable, but to a large part I think it is snails. I saw some of the leaves chewed and noticed those phosphorescent silver trails around the ravaged plant. In an imaginative attempt at preservation, I took to covering the remaining plants with plastic cups at night. I had cut out the bottom and placed them over the sprout to allow for light and growth and for a while it seemed to work until I saw the cups tipped over and the plant, eaten or gone. Perhaps all my garden pests were working in tandem and sharing the spoils; bunny knocking over cup and nibbling, snail slithering in and slurping, gopher munching from below, Dark God laughing.
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