Age and Greenery

Some things in life are inevitable, such as the setting of the sun, the turning of the tides, Gordon Brown's Jaw, and the ageing process.

The last one there sort of passed me by. Well, when I say passed me by, what I actually mean is that I was never fully aware of the implications of said aging process. I don't mean simple things like elongated nose hair - although quite what life has in store for me that I require extra long nasal hair to deal with it, I shudder to think. Some older readers may read that last sentence and think the same of elongated ear hair. If anyone can help me out with why I have needed to buy a pair of tweezers in the first regard then please do tell.

No, the thing I am talking about re the ageing process is how your tastes age in addition to everything else. Let me explain... It seems that I am now turning into my parents. This happened very suddenly and I lay the blame squarely at the door of some of my female friends. "Your flat looks too.. hmm... blokey". "Blokey?" I replied, in a raised tone of defensiveness. "Yep - it needs to be softened. Why don't you buy some plants or flowers, they'd look lovely". Now as a general rule, I have never bought flowers. They die within ten days and you wouldn't invest in a hamster if you knew it had the same shelf life.

Anyway, needless to say that I agreed to go, begrudgingly, on a plant buying spree with G (one of aforementioned platonic gf's), where i'm sure she enjoyed damaging my credit card on asorted house plants and other items. Now you might be expecting me to be sitting here now, begrudging spending good money on things that I didn't want in the first place,. Even more so with the knowledge that they will surely die if I don't water them at the exact same time each week or trim them or talk to them - something I have refused to do. There are limits after all! No, what I have discovered is that I love said plants. I have bought a vase and once a week I buy fresh flowers to sit in and generally look and smell good. And this is the problem...

From my early twenties I have generally rebelled against my ensuing age and even mourned the day that I could no longer go on a Club 18 - 30 holiday. I never actually wanted to go, (does anyone?) but the mere fact that I now cannot is something worth commemorating. Suddenly, in the midst of this rebellion, I have found that I now have a yukka plant in my bathroom and i'm happy to argue the merits of owning a vase of roses over a vase of Lillys (the pollen is a bugger with the latter). I was telling my good friend W about the new plant in my lounge and how the colour of the pot goes with the general colour theme of the room. It was at this point that I realised I had turned into my parents, as he looked at me and said "I'm buying you some Werther's Originals for Christmas".