I Bought a Blueberry Bush

It was an impulse purchase, the result of an impulse trip to a garden center that carries mint.

The berries on my blueberry bush are bright blue, which I like. The cultivar description promises, “Spring foliage has many shades of pink mixed with blue and deep greens, and turns a stunning iridescent turquoise blue in winter.” When I brought it home, I immediately began stressing over whether I should have bought two blueberry bushes, for cross-pollination. I went to sleep last night dreaming of ripe blueberry clusters, and woke, startled, with the realization that I had no idea how to properly acidify the soil!

The thing is, I don’t even like blueberries all that much. In fact, I would say they are my least favorite kind of berry. And my balcony is already so crammed full of plants that I don’t have space to water them. So what possessed me to buy a blueberry bush?

I’ve noticed that, since I threw in the towel and admitted to having a sitting disability, I’ve become more prone to this type of slightly irrational, snap decision making. An idea will burst into being in my mind, and shortly thereafter, it will take on the sheen of destiny. I crave something, but I’m not at all sure that thing is fresh produce.

The current coronavirus lockdown has inspired in me, as it has in many people, a range of reactions. Unimpeded access to oxygen is no longer something that can be taken for granted. The desire to go anywhere must be balanced against the logistical difficulties and safety risks. We hunker down in our homes, as if they were fallout shelters.

In the midst of a shut-down world, I am neglected and invisible. I festoon packages of homemade baked goods with ribbons and bows, and drop them off on my neighbors’ doorsteps. I ring the doorbell and run away, snickering as I go. I wonder if they’ll read my note, which says something like, “Do you have an excess of baked goods? I do. Please be my friend.”

I take a spiteful pleasure in watching extroverts cooped up at home, going insane under the weight of the lonely hours. Shoe’s on the other foot, I think. Not so easy now, is it? But my schadenfreude will be short-lived. The pandemic may stretch on a few more weeks or months, but eventually, the restrictions will lift for everyone but me. I will keep asking for Zoom call dinner parties, and I will be left behind when everyone else flocks back to restaurants.

Two years ago, in the fall and early winter of 2018, I worked almost entirely from home while “recovering” from surgery. After a year of driving to the office, and forcing myself to sit through meetings, and stand through phone calls, working from home felt unimaginably luxurious. I was more or less comfortable, stretched out on the couch while dialing into conference calls. It was an undeserved pleasure.

But slowly, something about it got under my skin. I became snappish and moody. I cried to my then-boyfriend (now husband) that all the color had gone out of my life. Amazon boxes started to arrive more regularly. On our weekly grocery store runs, I would wander the aisles, enthralled by the sheer variety and selection, and yet annoyed that the aisles were laid out in exactly the same pattern as the week before. Only the “SEASONAL” aisle showed any discernable change.

I instituted a mandatory, weekly date night with my boyfriend. I would pick a place and activity, and he would be a good sport and pretend to enjoy it. He must have realized it was good for his mental health, as well as mine. It meant the fire-breathing dragon he was dating would calm down for a while.

We went to an open mic night at the local LGBT center, where we laughed at ukulele music and cringed at bad poetry. We went to a sushi place where brilliant murals were painted to glow under UV lights. And we went to a video arcade where my boyfriend kicked my butt at pool, until I pouted, and ordered him to stop.

It worked, sort of. These outings added bright splashes of color into a world that felt increasingly drab. When I lay in bed at night, I could see murals shining at me under purple lights. I could hear electric music from a dozen arcade games, punctuated with sharp clacks from the air hockey table. And I could feel the cool, damp, basement air, and the surge of collective energy as the crowd cheered on the next insecure hipster.

New Jersey is the Garden State, and while it certainly didn’t earn that nickname on the strength of Newark’s post-industrial wasteland, it is shockingly easy to convince plants to grow here. Accustomed as I was to the barren, alkaline soils of the Missouri Plateau, it was a shock to see trees growing as weeds, and yards crowded with wild strawberries and violets. The long growing season can be divided into a hundred micro-seasons, in which ephemerals spring up and die back, biennials shoot up flower stocks, berries ripen on the vine, and black walnuts make a mess with their leathery green fruits.

Starving for novelty, I watched hungrily as the greenery around me constantly shifted. The tender shoots of lamb’s quarters would grow into sturdy, tree-like things with tenacious roots if you let them. Queen Anne’s lace would send up its spray of pinpricked white flowers, which later folded up into tangled birds’ nests. Splotchy green shoots of pokeweed would mature, offering up toxic dark berries on showy magenta racemes.

In early 2019, when it was clear my surgery had not done much to help, I found myself in a renewed state of desperation. I decided I needed to do something, anything, and I settled on a visit the Mayo Clinic. I applied to their spine center for a second time. They rejected me, again. I cried. Then I decided, medical verdict be damned, that I was getting into this clinic if it killed me.

In late January, I flew to Minnesota without an appointment. I was determined to picket outside the clinic doors if I had to, until they let me in.

The full story of my visit to Mayo will have to wait for another time. Suffice it to say that they did not fix me. But I doubt anyone has even been as thrilled as I was to fly to Minnesota in midwinter. For an unscheduled hospital appointment.

I arrived during a sub-arctic cold snap, and the coming weeks brought a series of blizzards. It was so cold that my nose ran in a steady drip, and my snot formed icicles that broke off, and bounced off my coat. It was so cold, I couldn’t take my hands out of my gloves long enough to get a Kleenex, or my fingers would freeze. Sunny days and subzero nights had created a slick layer of ice on the roads and sidewalks, and I landed flat on my butt several times.

Despite all this, my spirits soared, and I spent hours clomping through knee-high drifts in brand-new snow boots. Undaunted by the weather, I navigated the narrow aisles of a kitschy antique shop in my bulky coat, slid down the snowy banks of the Wal-Mart parking lot, and stared at pictures of early 20^th century motoring clothes at the Mayo Heritage Hall. After months of laying on the same couch, in the same apartment, and taking the same walks on the same paths, I finally had a new place to explore.

After my visit to Rochester concluded, I continued on to Fargo, where I stopped long enough to meet up with my boyfriend (who was himself returning from a trip to California). During a frigid photoshoot downtown, he pulled a ring box out of his pocket and dropped to one knee.

Wedding planning buoyed my spirits, since there was no shortage of beautiful, shiny things to look at. My head swam with pictures of gemstones, jeweled hair clips, and cascade bouquets. I studied black-and-white stationery patterns, and sequined blue shoes. Color was injected once again, and it was good.

I left my job in January, 2020, in order to move in with my husband in Newark. I wasn’t terribly worried about getting another job, but I hadn’t counted on the economic devastation unleashed by a pandemic.

Once spring crept into New Jersey, the collection of potted plants on my porch and under a grow lamp in my living room seemed to multiply of their own accord. First thing in the morning, I would check on them to see who had sprouted, who had wilted, who had flowered, and who had dropped their leaves.

My parents farm, and there’s a running joke that they name every sprout in their field. Apparently, I don’t know how to take a joke, because my plants grew into their own names. The rhubarb bulbs that mom mailed to me, and which sprouted in my crisper drawer, became Ruby and Barb. They sit next to Clive the chive, Portland the oregano, and Rathbone the basil. Rosemary and Sage arrived with perfectly serviceable names, and I refuse to call the green onions anything other than Dork Head.

This miniature landscape provides me with something to watch, and something to talk about. “The beans put out their pretty new flowers today.” “The squirrels clearly like basil as much as I do, judging by the crater they left.” “That tomato plant is such a lush! I might as well stick it in the bathtub.”

Like a first-time parent, I stress about my plants’ growth and development – are my squash’s leaves drooping because it’s thirsty, or does it need a bigger pot? Will that lavender ever sprout?

These are, I am well aware, dramas on the smallest scale. But I’m stuck inside. I can’t drink coffee, and I can’t measure out my life with coffee spoons. Instead, I throw my energy into nurturing these tendrils of life. And in return, these plants bring me something new, even if it is something as humble as a just-blue berry, or an iridescent turquoise leaf.

I miss breathing air unfiltered by a mask. I miss free samples at Costco, and working water fountains in the park. I miss sitting at a conference table, and whispering conspiratorially with a friend as we sit down to eat ramen with chopsticks. I miss road trips. I miss the theater. I miss color, and exploration, and the strange tension of a human connection that doesn’t go quite right.

But these things aren’t for sale. They aren’t laid out on shelves, waiting for me to pick them up and turn over the tag, to thump their bottoms, to place them in my cart. I can’t buy the things I miss.

And so, I bought a blueberry bush.