The little plant

McKenna Snow
Class of 2024

(2/2022) Sharing can be difficult. At least, though, you get half or so of whatever it is you’re sharing. Even harder it must be to give something away. Once you’ve given it away, it is not yours anymore, it belongs to the person you’ve given it to. And most of the time, the more you give something away, the less of it you have.

However, there are two things I know of that don’t operate this way: a little plant at my house, and love.

I’ve moved a lot in my childhood. There are certain things we’ve carted around for years, the little plant being one of them. It lives in this white pot, with some blue flowers painted on it. It’s a variation of the pothos plant, so its leaves are waxy, very individual, and a bright, pretty green. It is long, vine-like, and stringy, and also toxic to cats and birds (I grew up with dogs for pets, so this was never a concern). It is very bushy and full of leaves in the pot, and its vines trail down as long as we allow them to grow.

Carting this plant around for years never struck me as a big deal until sometime in middle school. I started noticing that around the house, we have other long plants exactly like this one, in other pots. They looked newer, in more modern pots you’d get at a store. I wanted to decorate my room with plants, so I asked my mom if I could have one of the pothos plants for my room.

Instead of just letting me have one of the plants, she showed me something. She took me to the white potted plant, with scissors, and showed me a section of one of the vines that didn’t have leaves on it. She cut this vine and told me to put the cut vine in a bottle of water, and to leave it in a windowsill.

She told me the vine needed at least a few months in the water, maybe six, because pothos plants have a great adaptability to grow new roots when submerged in water. Once they have grown lots of new roots, you pour out the water, get a pot with good dirt, and plant it.

I took good care of that cut pothos. I refilled the water as the little cut vine drank it up, and watched the roots slowly but surely grow. Eventually, I was able to pick out my own pot at the store, and I planted the pothos. It grew all throughout high school, its leaves stretching out to face wherever the most light was coming from.

It grew long and happy, and now it is with me in college. It sits at the top of my dresser, trailing down the side of it, facing the window. Now its top is bushy and lively, just like the older pothos.

In the friendships that I’ve made at the Mount, there have been a few times I’ve cut a long piece of my pothos off, put it in a water bottle, and given it to my friends as a gift. For me, it is a deeply personal gift because of its connection to my family and how long I’ve been taking care of my pothos. And now, the friends who have the water bottles with the pothos have been able to experience the roots growing throughout past semesters.

I admire the pothos because of how much it shows what love acts like. Love, like a plant, grows, wants sunlight and truth, and wants a sort of water that keeps it alive. And it is also capable of being cut, by a knife or scissors or some sharp experience, and to be submerged for months on end—only to grow even more.

The hardiness of love, then, should be thought of. How incredible is it that we have a visual such as a little plant, that has endured many changes and moves, many cuts and drownings, to show us how much love is capable of enduring. Love is stoic, and love is resilient. Love, like the plant, embraces the hardships, and wants to grow from them. Eventually, it can be taken out of the water and put in fresh soil. How good is it that love is this way, too!

Selfishness and complaining have no place in this submersion or trial, but instead asks a selfless question: how can we grow from this? How can we grow in patience for one another while we wait for new roots? Our old, comfortable vines have been severed from us, but with love we can overcome these difficulties. Real love, then, does not abandon or sugarcoat when something becomes difficult or something needs to be confronted. Instead, it carefully ensures that the other is in the sunlight, the truth, getting the nutrients and water needed to healthily go on. Love wills the good of the other, whether the lover benefits from it or not; it is not a fleeting feeling, but an ongoing choice, to care for the other in some way or another.

Better still is the plant’s ability to share, to grow, to be given away and yet to increase. Love, too, never really decreases the more you give it to others. In my experience, it only grows. Real love is disinterested in what it can gain for itself; rather, it is entirely interested in how it can give to others. It is willing to be cut, to suffer, and to change, for the good of another person. Sometimes real love hurts, and sometimes it feels comfortable and happy. But the good news is that love is not rooted in feelings, but in an ongoing decision to want what is best for the other person, regardless of circumstance.

This little plant at my house was a wedding present for my parents, who recently celebrated 27 years of marriage. Because of its giving and thriving nature, the plant is much more than a vine to me; it is a reminder of all that love is capable of enduring, doing, and becoming, the more it is given away to others.