fourth year anchal kumar

I leaned over the flourishing green plant with my mom as we tried to find a node on the vine to cut. She snipped with the scissors and held two healthy leaves from the golden pothos, or as she liked to call it, her money plant, which she had been nurturing for years now. For as long as I can remember, this plant had sat in the corner of the kitchen, watching us grow as a family. It had moved with us from our smaller house where I grew up, to a bigger, more accommodating house. My mother carefully placed the leaf cuttings in a small glass jar we found, and I filled it up with water. A global pandemic gave us the chance to reconnect with our plants and grow more through propagation.

My mother’s money plant started off as a little piece of green decoration to add some freshness to the house. The money plant had just always been a constant in my life, without me even realizing it. I came home from school, and it sat there with me in the kitchen as I feasted on Babybel cheese and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. It was just a pleasing piece of décor to me at the time. Little did I know the significance of the plant, and what it would mean to me years later.

We left our small house, my childhood home, behind and moved to a bigger house a few miles away. My mother brought the money plant over and it sat in the same spot again, just in a different environment. Its fixed spot was a corner in the kitchen that you could see from anywhere in the house if you were downstairs. Now, its vines tumbled all the way to the floor and the giant heart-shaped leaves were lusciously green. Our money plant was a symbol of us as a family. We had grown financially, physically (I was now a freshman in high school), and in number. Its long vines were always fascinating to my little brother who was a clumsy, tiny-fisted child grabbing everything in his sight. Not the money plant though. My mother would never let us touch her dear money plant for fear of disturbing its peace.

My mother’s tenderness towards plants is something she gets from her mother. In India, my grandmother grows a balcony full of plants which she religiously takes care of. They all have differently shaped leaves, some large and fan-like, others small and waxy. She had peace lilies and spider plants with leaves that grazed the ground. Her aloe vera plants made ours look infantile and her calathea, with their beautifully patterned green leaves and purple undersides, seemed to grow taller each time she called me to display her collection. They are her pride and joy. My mother’s money plant is much more than decoration to her. It is her connection to her mother, who lives across the sea, and it is now my connection to both my mother and grandmother.

I take the jar with the freshly cut pothos leaves and place it under a patch of sunlight by the kitchen’s windowsill. My own money plant, grown from my mother’s money plant makes my heart feel so full with love. My mom talks animatedly to me about how I have to switch out the water in the jar often so as to not destroy the baby leaves. Eventually, they will grow roots and then we can plant it in soil, she says. The next day, I FaceTime my grandmother and show her my new responsibility. She beams at me and starts showing me all of the new ones she has acquired and tells me how to achieve maximum growth with my tiny pothos. My grandmother lives thousands of miles away from me and belongs to an entirely different generation, and yet we have found common ground apart from being family. She and my mother exchange tips on how to best propagate a snake plant and I realize the distance between us has been reduced to almost nothing with the help of some green houseplants. Something which I believed was mere decoration was actually the bridge between three generations of women.

I have recently rooted my baby money plant in fertile soil, which has grown into a young adult, like me. My mom and I have greatly expanded our collection and I call my grandmother every week for more tips as we are trying to start our own herb garden. I do my best to take care of my money plant and will be taking it with me wherever I go in life. It is a piece of good luck, a reminder of my mother’s love, and a bridge back to my encouraging grandmother.

Bridge of Vines