If you’ve spent even five minutes around me, you’ve probably noticed that I’ve become a little obsessed with plants. At first, they were just my newest hobby. As a very proud Gemini, I have a habit of diving headfirst into whatever catches my interest. This time it was plants. So naturally, I decided that I wanted to be a plant connoisseur. I wanted to see how much I could make a plant grow. I wanted to see if I could actually keep one alive and maybe even help it thrive.
Somewhere along my journey of becoming a plant connoisseur I realized that I wasn’t just collecting plants, like you would a figurine or like this generation does with those mystery boxes. No, I realized that I was collecting reminders.
Every time I water them, trim a dying leaf, or notice a new one unfolding, I’m reminded that growth rarely looks dramatic.
Most of the time it happens quietly.
One of my plants is overflowing with leaves. Another spent weeks looking like it wasn’t going to make it before finally pushing out one tiny green sprout. Another hasn’t changed much at all. If I judged them against each other, I’d probably think one was successful and another was failing.
But plants don’t work like that.
One of my plants actually surprised me. At first it seemed to be doing well but then suddenly its growth was stunted. I felt like no matter how much love I poured into it, it looked sparse and empty and frail. For months, maybe even a year if I’m not being generous, it was definitely my struggling plant. Then suddenly I changed up the formula. I realized I was caring for it the way I thought it needed and not the way it actually did. So I decided to start from scratch. Oftentimes people are scared to start over. Cutting off leaves to propagate is basically doing that, resetting your plants progress. But in reality sometimes you need to start again in order to flourish. That’s what my plant did. A hard reset. A little less sun and weekly watering. A little fertilizer here and there for an extra boost.
Plants aren’t simple.
Neither are people.
Different needs.
Different timing.
Different seasons.
I think life works the same way. Sometimes we’re flourishing, sometimes we’re healing from losing leaves. Sometimes we’re putting down roots where nobody can even see the progress yet. Just because growth isn’t obvious doesn’t mean it isn’t happening. Like one of my newer plants. During an emotional season of my own life, I was convinced that I was taking one of my plants down with me. What was once a beautiful plant was down to nothing. Watching its leaves disappear felt strangely personal. But then new growth appeared.
So I decided to give every plant a name. Not because they need one but because every one of them feels like a tiny character living alongside me.
Together they’ll remind me that growth isn’t a race.
It’s a collection of seasons.
Over the next year, I want to document them here. The new leaves. The flowers. The plants that struggle. The ones that surprise me. And maybe, somewhere between all of those updates… I’ll get to watch myself grow too.
Maybe that’s the real reason I keep buying plants. Every new leaf feels like permission to believe in new beginnings.
— softly, Nash 🌱
Garden Notes
Meet the little reminders behind this story.
softly, Nash 
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