Learn to Keep Your Plants Alive

For most of my adult life, I have scorned plants. I have never really liked them and they have always seemed to die around me. The only plant I've managed to keep alive was an orchid I received for my 16th birthday that seemed determined to live long and prosper: it bloomed four times in a year of having it. I had to scrap it only because I ended up leaving town for a couple of months and had no one to take care of it who knew what they were doing with plants. That orchid was the exception though.

In Lisbon, I eventually took notice of the two-inch succulents often on sale in supermarkets for the cost of a baguette. They're adorable. I figured I would probably kill one if I got it. I also thought that all of the materials for making a terrarium would be more expensive than I could justify. Moving roughly every six months and not knowing whether I would be somewhere with living conditions that could maintain a plant also posed its own problems, be it for social or lighting reasons, and so the idea of keeping plants remained an idea that would spring to mind when walking by them at the store or late at night during wishful Google searches, educating myself on how best to take care of one just in case. You can't kill a plant that exists only on Pinterest or in tumblr images.

Since moving, however, I decided that it would be a good time to take advantage of stable housing and IKEA warehouses that are easier to access via public transit. My apartment is small and the light is not perfectly ideal for sun-hogging plants like basil, but the climate in Barcelona is favorable for growing just about anything. It's not too dry, it's not too humid, and the temperatures are never extreme. What I thought would be a small, cheap indulgence quickly proved to be a deceiving source of enjoyment, starting with a collection of cacti and a lucky bamboo, culminating in several more succulents, attempts to propagate new succulents from bigger plants, and an assortment of other types of foliage that look nice and aren't fussy.

It turns out that the secret to keeping plants alive if you have a brown thumb is to buy plants that are hard to kill. That may seem like a cop-out, but with a little bit of research on how to set up your plants (what kind of soil do they require?), how much to water them (you can't just starve a cactus of water until you remember?), and how much sunlight they need (can plants survive with artificial lights?), easy plants are, indeed, easy. There are many more questions than I had first anticipated (see above), and the process is different than I had attempted with other plants. That said, I seem to have found a rhythm and the plants are thriving.

Cacti are succulent plants as well, so all together, the plants tend to fall into similar watering routines and need similar amounts of sunlight. Propagating succulents turns out to be similarly easy. Usually they will take root from a leaf that has fallen and dried, sprouting a tiny new plant in a matter of days. It doesn't always work—over- or under-watering the leaves and not letting the end dry can ruin them—but in most cases, you can quickly grow the cute little plants that seem so cheap and enticing at the store right from your own larger plants at home.

The way you arrange the plants allows for a lot of room to be creative. You can create a terrarium from just about anything, so long as it has space to allow for drainage. I found a bunch of pots around the apartment going unused, so I decided to take advantage of them for the sake of saving money on buying new ones. I've so far only had to get two pots, one of which houses a small ficus, and the other, which houses the two larger succulents. The smaller plants that remain in two-inch containers, as well as the propagated succulents in their glazed pot, will eventually be moved into more visually appealing homes, but for now, it works together as a set. I'm particularly fond of the clay pot with a cork-like textured outer appearance.

Cost, as I mentioned, was a concern. I assumed soil, fertilizer, pots, and any other treatments might end up exorbitantly inflating the single-digit cost of the plants, but as it turns out, if you do your research, you can get all of those things for a minimal amount of money. Plants can be found everywhere, from your local florist and supermarkets to bigger specialty stores and places like IKEA. I got my cacti from IKEA in a pack together for €3.50, the three succulents in the clay pot were purchased at a local plant shop for €1.50 together, and the remaining succulents were gifts that came from the garden of a neighbor who has a house overrun with plants in the mountains. Sandy, fast-draining soil for cacti and other succulents cost €1.50 for 5kg (more than plenty to get a small arrangement like mine set up, with soil left for more) at the only large garden center in Barcelona city limits, conveniently a short walk from home, and the rocks used for drainage and decoration range from €1.50 to €2.50, depending on the size of the pebbles. Water is free (well, nothing is free, but it's not an extra cost relative to the plants), so it's nothing to worry about, and the season for giving these kinds of plants fertilizer is several months away still, so those are costs not to worry about. Otherwise, pots are very flexible. You probably have some lying about your house that you forgot about like I did. The ones I paid for ranged from €2 to €3.50. In total, for the cost of a nice lunch, you can get your own plants.

Keeping the plants alive costs nothing, though, and there's nothing to say you shouldn't have fun with them. They're pretty, they're cute, they even may seem to have personalities of their own. I grow cilantro that is very sassy—dramatically flopping about and perking up based on the sun, water conditions, and what kind of mood it happens to be in. I like to give the plants names as well, old-fashioned lady-style names. I couldn't tell you why I find my plants to be ladies, but it seems to fit them better. So I have Mildred, Winnie, Edna, Letitia, Eunice, and Henrietta, among others. As they grow, they give way to new arrangements and make space for new small plants. Just be careful, once they start growing, you may not be able to stop getting new plants to thrive in your house—I can't seem to now.

Adulthood and Staying Put

It seems to have been an eternity since the content I've placed here was a written post. There are various reasons for that, since I haven't been idle in the meantime, but I figured I'd preface this post anyway, as I usually do. The site has also been revamped in the meantime, with a continually evolving About page, cleaned up sidebars, and more visible options to follow what I'm doing elsewhere. I like the logotype better too, and who knows, perhaps I'll start to draw things for the site itself instead of just posts.

In my latest video, I make a disclaimer life update saying that I haven't been up to much of anything. That isn't entirely true; from the preface alone you can tell I've been busying myself with projects to improve my skills in the areas I enjoy most, but which can also be of use in the freelance world and perhaps eventually in a professional capacity as well. There is a lot that seems to have thrown itself up in the air since the end of my MA courses, and money is naturally the underlying factor in it. Or, well, a lack thereof. However, I have a hard time sitting still, so I have been creating and working on skills while trying to find work and freelance jobs and have been reflecting on this process of being more or less free as an adult to do so.

It is peculiar to arrive at 22 and suddenly be fully in charge of yourself, your finances and sustenance included. Living quite far from family helps to add emphasis to the point, since there is only a minimal, intangible connection that you can have with the people who can support you and help you through life's problems as a last resort. I have come to find myself in a place where the problems of life are made somewhat more difficult due to local conditions—the employment situation of Portugal is much worse than urban America—which offset the benefits of my choice to carve out a life in a new environment.

Yet it is precisely the freedom to make such a decision that comes perhaps as the greatest surprise, since it is not just one day that you wake up and a button has been pressed so that you are doing everything you want in your life. Many of the things we do before arriving at the age of majority set us up for what we will do afterward, as if the fluidity of time were only there to smack us in the face in retrospect. We grow up with binds that serve to imitate the responsible choices we have to make as adults: semesters that lead to progress toward a diploma, summer jobs that lead to experience for admissions, practice in extracurricular activities so that we might be able to perform them in front of others later. As an adult, there are no such structural binds, no inherent requirement to make sure that we do what we're doing with targeted points of accomplishment, we must simply do for ourselves lest we suffer the consequences of being homeless and living in a box down by the river.

So we work and do what we need to in order to eat and stay housed, but there are no limits to what is possible. In a way, this freedom has the opposite effect, creating an anarchy in which we have to set up routines and seemingly inevitable goals or marks of progress in order to have comfort. As a traveler, however, realizing that there is nothing tying you to to the place you have spent some time in, whether it is your childhood home or where you have studied or worked for a few years, is both liberating and terrifying. There may not be the comfort of home or any certainty of what lies ahead, but you're always free to change scenery and try things out somewhere else. Bureaucracy can be dealt with, languages can be learned, cultures can be absorbed, money can be earned. The only thing that can stop you from making that leap is a false sense of security in where you are and what you're doing simply because you have been there for some time and have been doing that for some time.

I have come to a similar point, feeling attached to and absorbed in Portuguese culture due to exposure and interaction, yet often find myself very decisively on the fringes of it. Thinking along these lines, it is hard to envision a future living elsewhere instead of just taking time to travel. Yet the requirements of work and establishing some form of a career for the sake of sustenance put a damper on travel, and so the question of mobility comes up. Where might there be new adventures, cultures, languages, and opportunities to be had in the face of pressure to stay put? For the time being, all signs point to Barcelona. But the path to get there has not been met without a hearty, perhaps arbitrary, resistance.

Recipe: Rustic Cabbage

After making this various times and tinkering with it until it came out just the way I wanted, I decided to make a graphic to share this recipe with you all. It goes great with dumplings, rice, and endless other dishes. You can substitute the sesame oil for any similar oil as long as it is similarly fragrant—eastern Europeans might like sunflower oil, for example. I hope you enjoy, let me know how it is if you decide to make it! This recipe is available in Portuguese as well as English. It's in A4 format so that you can print the recipe out if you'd like, but don't remove the credit or modify the design in any way.

Depois de ter feito isso várias vezes e modificar ele de pouco a pouco até ficar exactamente como queria, resolvi desenhar um gráfico para partilhar esta receita com vocês. Fica muito bem com bolinhos de massa (os chamados «dumplings» comuns na cozinha asiática e do leste da Europa), arroz e outros pratos inumeráveis. Podem substituir o óleo de sésamo por qualquer outro óleo semelhante desde que seja similarmente saboroso—gente de leste se calhar gostaria de óleo de girassol, por exemplo. Espero que gostem e se decidirem fazê-lo, digam-me como ficou! Esta receita está disponível em português tal como em inglês. O formato é A4 para poderem imprimir a receita a vontade, mas façam-me o favor de não tirar o crédito nem modificar o desenho de qualquer maneira.

Pride

Since we're in the midst, or perhaps the tail end of, pride season, I thought it would be timely to reflect on the value of the word and the celebrations we see in colorful form throughout the world. It can also be viewed as a part two of my previous post on my experience in and relationship with the queer community.

As my previous post alludes to, pride for me is about more than the queer or excessively-lettered-acronym community and its struggles for equal rights and social normalization. To borrow a term that has become loaded from what I flippantly call the cult of political correctness, but has also been described in articles I've read as the "internet moral police", I come from the relatively privileged position of benefitting from coming from a place where many of the objectives of said process of social normalization have successfully taken root and have accordingly never suffered any trauma for the sake of my status as some form of a minority. I relate with my less fortunate peers not from personal experience so much as an overarching desire to see and understand the viewpoints of more humans in the world as simply being human, and respecting our differences in the process. I want to see equality and justice for all, in a world not run by aging white conservative heterosexual men; I do not want to see any specific group prosper more than another.

Pride for me, in turn, takes on a meaning that is more wrapped up in my own peculiar weave of minority-status and privilege-wielding. Since I live in a foreign country and spend a significant amount of my time in yet another one, all of these considerations are compounded when we apply local context and the extent of my integration into them. I am not just me, an average white queer male college student, I am a all of those things plus the addition of being them as an American in a continent where it is intellectually voguish (in the best of cases) to find fault in all things American. Pride in my situation means contending with a very different set of social difficulties than my contemporaries in the US, but especially my contemporaries in the relatively progressive enclave I was raised in. So let's take a look at all of those elements instead of writing anything more about their meaning.

Pride for me is:

• Being an under-spoken member of the queer community, donating when I am able to money to targeted interests that promote an end to legal mechanisms that keep people like myself in a position of being discriminated against and resisting the small and often overlooked acts of repression that are taken for granted by so many, such as it being somehow impertinent to hold hands in public. Because of this, I don't feel the need to wear a rainbow flag or attend parades or partake in specifically queer-oriented activities, for which I am often called a "bad gay" by less enlightened peers. Shame on them. I am proud to be a supporter of the cause in my own way.
• Not standing by for casual acts of -isms, correcting friends and family on jokes taken to be innocuous, harmful patterns of speech, unenlightened views on controversial topics. I'm not perfect, nor could I imagine being an internet (read: tumblr) vigilante about it, but in my day to day personal interactions with people, I do my best. I'm proud to be proactive about continually being a better version of myself by learning and becoming more enlightened over time and passing that along to others.
• Standing up for what is good about being an American. The reality of life in Europe is that you are, as an American person, confronted with hostilities in greater number than the admirations of American people and culture. These come in the form of passive actions as much as the other way around, such as from well-intentioned "oh but you know other things so well", among other things. I may not think everything that is done or everyone from my native country is the best, but it does not stop me from liking it, appreciating it, and even often holding it in higher esteem than others. I am proud to be an American, even if it makes up just a fraction of my pluralistic conception of self.
• Embracing a pluralistic view of myself and the world. I am proud to be many things at the same time in many different places and situations, and I want nothing more than to live in a world where those around me are as well.

If you made it this far, tell me in a comment or a tweet (or an email, or a passenger pigeon, or what have you) what the concept of pride means for you. As the cliche goes, this sort of introspection should be embraced the year round, not just during a couple of party-fueled weekends in warm summer months.

Getting a Reputation

Once, when I was in high school, we got a crop of new teachers at the school who would begin working with us. One of them came up to me after a short while and greeted me with “Hi, nice to meet you. Your reputation really precedes you.” At the time, I had no idea what that meant.

As I’ve gotten older and come into my own as an adult, the concept has clarified itself considerably. My MA colleagues tend to describe me as “coherent” and it extends beyond just them. Professors, former colleagues, all the way to friends of many years and family would all describe me in similar terms. It is possible that I have maintained a roughly similar character as time has gone on, although I feel that I have changed considerably since my adolescence, but the primary difference between then and now is that I’ve become consciously aware of the reputation I have and actively cultivate and maintain some aspects of it. The main lesson of being an adult, much more so than others and beyond managing the increased levels of responsibility that it entails, is that of being aware of yourself in relation to the world around you and accepting what you can and can’t change about it.

The difference between the ideal version of ourselves—the effortlessly and impossibly motivated, well-eating, frugal, extra-ambitious, workaholic versions of ourselves that we may envision in our minds when thinking about when making resolutions at the end of the year that will go unresolved—and the real version of ourselves has much to do with this concept of awareness. We are all capable of doing what we set out to do and put our energies toward, but invariably we don’t always do everything, or do everything that we attempt to perfectly. Projects can languish, procrastination can rule, lower targets can be set out of necessity. Managing how you are seen by others is a balancing act between composure, social communication, and demonstrating your cachet through action.

It's also a bit of a roulette wheel that involves other people doing much the same and what kind of moments you happen to encounter them in. Sometimes you get off to a bad start with people simply because you get off to a bad start with them, others the reverse is true. Sometimes you can solidify habits that you weren't aware were major parts of your character simply because a critical mass of others pick up on them at the right moment. The part that matters is how consistent you are in doing things and how aware you are of what you're doing, even passively. If you can pick up on the things you're doing by not doing other things or the implications of what you're actively doing, you can direct your behavior in a way that lets you stay in charge of your persona to others.

So I may be relaxed about my punctuality in social contexts (ed. but if you're a potential employer reading this: my work ethic is meticulous and I am both punctual and proactive.) but I am known for the quality of my pursuits and what I put out in the world, from academia to cultural outings, and I like it that way. I could be more of a workaholic or more of a morning person or more of a social butterfly, but my way of being social serves my needs and interests and I feel comfortable knowing that I have a handle on it. I think we all could benefit from that.

What is Home to a Traveler?

I have travelled, if not extensively, at least an appreciable amount around Europe now, enough to have a sense of cultural preferences, things I like about traveling generally, things I dislike about traveling, and where I could or should plan out my list of next places to visit for the first time. I’ve reached a point of getting to know the countries of Western Europe in particular to such an extent that I’ve seen three different types of places emerge: the places I love and could easily see myself living in, where I feel in tune with the culture and (probably) speak the language; the places I like to visit, but don’t appreciate on a profound enough level to consider moving there under normal circumstances; and everywhere else, from indifference to active hostility. What is it about the places in the first group that makes them different?

My first reaction is to say that it’s a gut instinct, that you just experience it, a certain feeling whether upon arrival or after a short time spent in a place. You connect with the particular energy of a city when you enter it and just know that it’s right for you. That, however, is not too satisfying to the inquisitive person asking why? So I’ll elaborate on it with a little bit about each of the three places I’ve come to accept as such and why.

1. Lisbon

Lisbon is home. It is the city I actually call home, where I have my legal residence, where all most of my possessions reside, and where I study and (look for) work. It got to be that way by accident, but I made a conscious decision to come back time after time, because it has a very familiar mixture of provincialism and cosmopolitanism that I connected with quickly coming from Denver, with the advantage of an extremely mild southern European climate that doesn’t know or understand snow. Lisbon has many layers despite its small size; it is strikingly beautiful at a glance but a further look into the nitty-gritty of it reveals plenty of ugly faults. It’s a city where walking the streets gives a strong sense of opportunity, a sort of “what if?” that I resonate with, seeming to always spend my time wondering more about the future than living in the present.

2. Paris

I have often described Paris as akin to visiting relatives: it’s a home you can always go back to, but too much time in it at once gets frustrating. Once you’ve taken your time to tourist your way about the city, it opens up different faces of itself to you in neighborhoods you wouldn’t have had a reason to visit if you wanted to see any of the innumerable landmarks, museums, or other points of interest to visitors. It’s less expensive than the touristic side of the city can make it out to be, and has just as much of a diversity of people and lifestyles as a city of so many millions ought to. I learned French from an early age and get on quite naturally well with French culture; I’ve never particularly experienced the supposed snootiness or arrogance of Parisians the way they’re famed to be. Quite the contrary, I have made many close friends who constitute a social base that lets me feel at ease and at home in the city of lights.

3. Barcelona

Barcelona combines the things I like most about Paris and Lisbon in one city while being a microcosm of political issues that I study academically. I find the city easy to access and not lacking any of the creature comforts that I am accustomed to from the other side of the Atlantic, though linguistically it is still more inaccessible than Paris or Lisbon. As a linguist of sorts, the challenge of diving into a new linguistic surrounding is a positive point, as life feels more dynamic when everything is a discovery in how to go about the routines of life differently. Barcelona is less overwhelming than Paris and larger enough than Lisbon not to feel like an overgrown village, with modern and well-functioning public transport alongside a pedestrian-friendly footprint. Had it not been for Lisbon, Barcelona would probably have become my “other” destination outside of Paris.

Despite being well-known and large cities with considerable touristic volume (less so in the case of Lisbon), all of these cities have something that works for my rhythm of being. They’re different from the places I simply like but wouldn’t live in because in each there’s a personal element—be it the cultural similarities of Lisbon and my hometown or the southern European cosmopolitanism of Barcelona—that distinguishes them from the crowd. I’m inclined toward southern Europe perhaps because my linguistic knowledge propels me there, but also because over the long of time I seem to have adapted plenty of its mannerisms considered typical. Quite the opposite is true of many people I know, yet when comparing notes on why the conclusions are much the same: the places you could call home might be different from where you came, but they resemble it (or are diametrically opposed to it; the principle of side of the same coin applies) enough that their choice only seems natural.

Where would you call home if not for where you’re at now, why?

How Cleaning Your Toilet Makes You More of an Adult

“Good morning, happy birthday! I have something very special planned for us to do. Grab your dirty laundry and follow me,” my mother greeted me on my 13th birthday. She proceeded to show me how the washing machine worked and the proportions of detergent necessary for each type of clothing, as well as the importance of removing lint from the filter in the dryer. “If you want me to do your laundry for you, you can pay me. I’m sick of this shit.”

Adolescence dropped unexpectedly and the process of becoming an adult does so as well, albeit more gradually. You don’t wake up one day to “surprise! Today you’re an adult.” In fact, most of us don’t ever really feel more grown up than our late adolescence, it’s a condition put upon us by the passing of time and increasing responsibilities that entails. We’re adults because we have to be, not because we asked to be—and that means that some of us never quite get there, either.

So where does the toilet come in? It’s very simple. Part of the process of becoming an adult is establishing a level of autonomy and independence from the environment in which we’re raised. For some, it means moving out of their parents’ house altogether, for others, it means paying them rent or increased levels of autonomy within the household domain. Perhaps separate groceries, perhaps cleaning the house more, but the underlying principle is the increasing of responsibilities. When you move out, in particular, there are endless untold surprises, things that pop up as expenses and inconveniences that we take for granted in the cocoon of our familial homes. Things like toilet paper, food, and yes, even the toilet.

Much like adulthood, the toilet is always there, and it is always a necessity, whether we like it or not. We are physically obligated to use it, and for the interest of our health and sanitation, we are obligated to clean it. When you leave home, whether it was your responsibility or not previously, it is yours now. The consequences are heavy if it doesn’t get done, even if it’s easier to put off indefinitely. So it takes much of the motivation and willpower that could be spent, say, watching the television or on the internet, to get up, put the gloves on, and get intimate with the porcelain bowl. It takes acknowledging a continual responsibility and addressing it consistently and with an effort and skill adequate to ensure that you’re not putting your health at risk because of the state of your toilet, to say nothing of the embarrassment of inviting guests over to a filthy home.

Cleaning the toilet isn’t fun. It isn’t sexy, nor is it a particularly noteworthy event, something to recount to friends and family after accomplishing. It’s just one of the things we’re obligated to do, thanklessly. Being an adult is often like that.