In consideration of three coincidences

I have two Kalanchoes in my houseplant collection. One I have had for almost two years in February. Another I bought in November. It did not occur strange to me that both were in bloom when I obtained them. I also don’t recall the process my first Kalanchoe went through after it stopped blooming, but the plant looks very different now than it did when I first got it (I assumed it was an off year for the dear plant). My second Kalanchoe stopped blooming when I returned from my holiday travels. The flowers were brown and shriveled. Sullivan mentioned that it had died. I took it to the sink and began pinching them off. Then I realized I didn’t know anything about these plants, so I did some research on the internet.

It turns out Kalanchoe’s are forced into blooming out of season through artificial stimulation by the commercial growers. Apparently the process is “difficult” though I couldn’t find a description of exactly what was involved (closely controlled climate, I imagine). And the result is that the plant will flower once, but is unlikely to flower again. The plants are therefore considered “throwaway” houseplants. However some of the articles say it’s possible, since a Kalanchoe will naturally flower in the spring if left to it’s own devices, for it to bloom again. I trimmed the heads off my plant and made a spot on the table for it to rest during the winter.

What struck me about this experience, is that even when it’s not in bloom, my Kalanchoes are lovely little green living things, and I wonder how many of them are chucked out into the cold once their flowers begin to fall.

At the grocery.

Freyja was climbing out of the cart, Sullivan was running circles around me. The aisles were crammed full of people doing their shopping. I stood in the bread aisle, trying to decide which bread to buy.

I did not know which bread to buy.

There were perhaps a hundred different varieties. Multiple brands, “name brand” and generic, of the same type of bread. White. Wheat. Some mixture. Whole grain white. Whole grain wheat. Some combination. Rye. Raisin. Sourdough. All packaged in colorful plastic bags. Why are there so many types of bread in the store? Who buys all these different breads? Who buys the same bread in different colorful plastic bags? Why are all of these breads made and brought here?

I did not know which to buy.

The kids were asking me to let them ride the moving plastic horse in the front of the store. Many people were moving close to me with their carts full of boxes of things and jars of stuff.

The breads were all bagged in different colorful bags.

A man was stocking the shelves. An older man was asking the bread stocker about the bread. He was complaining that the brand on sale did not freeze well. That he suspected that it was more than a day old.

The bread stocker laughed, “Well I know it’s more than a day old. That’s why it’s all so cheap!”

All of the loaves of bread became Leggo blocks. Everything was plastic and multicolored. The man stocking the bread was a Leggo man. The old man was a Leggo man.

Tears came to my eyes. A Leggo woman with a full cart of Leggo blocks next to me whispered, “Are you okay?”

I said, “I don’t know which bread to buy.”

“Don’t stress out about it. Just pick one. They’re all the same, really.”

“Thank you, no.” I whispered. A pit grew in my stomach. I couldn’t feed my children plastic. I didn’t buy any bread.

The picture above is not mine.

I set an alarm for 2:20 a.m. A time I figured would give me some minutes to dress, find my coat and camera and head outside to watch the Quadrantid meteor shower. Of course, five minutes before my cell alarm went off, Sullivan ran into my room frightened from a nightmare. A few minutes later, the curious alarm woke him up completely. I told him we were going to go outside to look at meteors, a topic he has some interest in (as a dinosaur aficionado - have I mentioned he’s 4?). We bundled up and went out into the back yard with our little dog.

The sky was cloudy and the city lights sent a haze over the moon, but I could see some stars and I could see Mars and what I suspected was Venus. I pointed these out to him (he was unimpressed). After fifteen or so minutes, the dog started whining to go inside. Sullivan started asking me questions like “Are you sure meteors are real?” in the same tone of voice he asks me about fairies, trolls, magic, Santa and the Greek gods I tell him stories about. With the same skepticism that he asks, “Are you sure this plant is still alive?” With that same look he gives me when I am wiping my eyes in the grocery store because everything is made of plastic; his fruitbat, card-throwing, gypsy mama, who has no answers, this time, but a string of questions and coincidences that feel connected through the ether, asking him to watch some endless sky in the frigid cold for some mystical phenomena that may not even exist in his world.

We did not see a single meteor after twenty minutes, so we came inside, the dog, the boy and I. I put him to bed, but it was perhaps too late. He had trouble sleeping the rest of the night. I sat at the table, gnawing on my decisions, some pit growing in my stomach, retelling the entire story to a tired and spent houseplant.