How My Peace Lily Got Its Name

I came home one day to find that my landlord had chopped down my peace lily. Since this was only the latest in a long string of affronts, I wasn’t so much surprised or angry as just genuinely sad.

First of all, I’d had that peace lily for six years. In that time, it had survived:

• My six months in London without water (I had to leave it in America and forgot to ask anyone to water it while I was gone)
• A small dog jumping onto its leaves regularly because she believed they could hold her weight
• Five days in the back of a moving truck with no sunlight

Not to mention the years of haphazard care during the four moves and various relationships of my early-to-mid twenties. The idea that after all this struggle its demise would be my roommate’s decision to destroy it rather than ask me to move it out of a common area just because it looked droopy seemed…well, unfair to say the least.

Second, the lily had been a gift from a good friend. One that I don’t see as often as I’d like these days, but whom I thought of when I watered the lily or turned it in the the window. Removing those things from my routine seemed like the end of an era.

Third, regardless of how droopy the plant may have looked, the barren shoots were green, meaning it had still been alive when my landlord cut it down.

I was mourning these green stubs when I realized there was still a single leaf hiding at the base of the plant. One little leaf that had likely never felt the sunshine until the terrible incident, but now had full access to the world above.

There was still hope that I could bring my peace lily back to its former glory. I moved it to my new home and put it on my bedside table. I’m happy to say that after several months of diligent watering and access to sunlight, my peace lily is thriving once again.

I don’t usually name my plants. I love the idea of naming them, but they never seem to fit unless christened by someone else in my life. After hearing its story, my partner named the peace lily Lazarus and the name has stuck ever since.

Why am I telling you about my stupid peace lily?

I’ll admit that this week’s blog is less green-centric than most of my articles, but I suppose the moral of the story is: People are going to cut you down. They’re going to screw you over for selfish reasons. But with a little hope and a lot of hard work, you can still come back as strong as ever. At the end of it all, people may point to you and say, “Wow, what a miracle that you made it through all that.” But you’ll know the truth.

Now please enjoy these time lapse photos of Lazarus the Peace Lily: