What Recession?

R.I.P.

Money Tree (June 2008-February 2009)

This is actually our second-generation money tree. The first one officially killed itself when we moved into our new apartment. Who could blame it? What with the major rent increase, it just couldn't self-motivate to promote prosperity any longer.

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I bought this money tree immediately after because I'm totally superstitious and believe in shit like money trees. This one was lush and full, reaching and striving out if its little pot toward greatness. And then in January, as I was fretting my way through the Christmas holiday, preparing for school, obsessing over adult acne and downsizing, a little brown border slowly began to develop around its leaves. At first I came home to one, then two rigid crusty leaf remnants on the floor under the TV cabinet. I ignored it. I continued to play a relentless stream of morning NPR with its elevated recession talk and analysis. I poured more and more coffee. I applied more and more Retin-A. And then my face began to dry up too, peeling away, layer after layer, revealing a rippling map of arid wrinkles on either side of my brow. I eyed the money tree. Dry. Me. Dry. NPR. Dry.

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With each passing day the money tree surrendered another leaf or two. I found one on top of my American Poetry Anthology and yet another in a little crystal bowl of seashells. And each morning I'd wake up and gaze in the mirror to see myself peering out from under an onion skin, recessing too. The money tree must've shed its last leaf the same morning I woke up to NPR as my alarm, declaring, "Good morning. Nissan lays off 20,000, posting a loss of $8billion." The radiator steamed and clanged, sucking moisture out of the air. As I rose in the dark and stumbled into the living room, I saw the tree's skeletal, spiny trunk and branches laid bare on top of my bookshelf. I felt a short wave of despair rise and wash over me. 'This is it', I thought. The vapors of the recession had finally made their way up through our vents and floorboards that morning. It was really true. We had another suicidal money tree.

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I let it sit on top of the bookshelf for nearly a week, partly as a reminder of how dry we really were, partly because I hoped it could be revived. Finally, I stuffed the entire tree in its pot into the kitchen trashcan where it was kept company by Ramen wrappers and other evidence of the drought. In its place I now have a little rose plant featuring two delicate miniature red blooms. Its tag declares it a "love rose" plant. I've been nearly drowning it in water.

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I can deal with two suicidal money trees. But a love plant with a death wish would finish me off.