Green thumb: Gardening on a balcony

Add the Talkmistress to the gazillions who, in the midst of the pandemic, have discovered gardening.

In my case, it’s a rediscovery. My last attempt at serious gardening came with my last attempt at home ownership in the double-aughts. It was then that I discovered that contrary to what I’d believed prior, I could plant something and it actually live.

The gardening spirit arose again when I came to the realization that our sixth-floor, rented-condo balcony needed more than just a couple of patio chairs and tables.

The whole thing started with several gift plants. Jack, a neighbor, gardens around the complex and got permission to hand me off a half-dozen impatiens, which I repotted in our landlady’s ceramic container.

(An aside here: Yes, I’m one of the clueless ones who, when first seeing the flower name “impatiens,” wondered what happened to the “t” at the end. Was the flower namer so lacking in patience that he/she rushed the job by leaving it off?)

The impatiens were planted in the same pot as a poinsettia given us by another neighbor at Christmastime; we’d kept it inside all winter and it continued to thrive. Initially, the poinsettia wasn’t happy with its relocation; it, like all us old coots, apparently doesn’t take change well. I added the impatiens, assuming the poinsettia was about to bite the dirt it was planted in. But its now-green leaves are peeping happily from among the flowers. A third plant, a family of easy-to-please succulents in a ceramic pot shaped like half of a large teacup, was given me by my fitness trainer’s mom. They, too, have thrived. So has a pot of succulent varieties I’d also been given and keep indoors.

I soon began to yearn for a fullfledged container garden to give my family of freebies some company. In search of an eclectic mix of plants, flowers and herbs, I set off for a couple of the big gardening retailers. Here’s some of what I came away with. They all came with “how to care for” information stuck down in the dirt, or printed on the label … information that might have been read a bit hastily due to garden-starting eagerness, coupled with end-of-spring, “Wait, I thought I was going to heaven!” heat.

■ Croton, and Croton’s Mama. Got two pots, purchased on different visits, of the plant with the big leaves in what hubby calls African colors. Croton’s Mama was the

same price as the first croton, but about three times bigger … and in three different sections, all hollering not “Feed me!” per Audrey II in Little Shop of Horrors, but “Repot me!”

■ Drama Queen Cherry Tomato Plant and Drama Queen Sweet Basil plant. Forget to water either of these early and often, and their leaves wither and droop. Water them and they look happy again. We’ve already harvested basil leaves to jazz up some blackeyed peas. The tomatoes are taking their sweet time: We’ve got one adolescent and two babies as of this writing. Being “impatien,” we may put the tomato leaves in our salad instead.

■ Fonzie, our lavender plant. Even when the dirt dries up, it still looks good, and it’s growing flowers. It’s cool as a cucumber, hence the name stolen from the old Happy Days TV-series character.

■ Get In Trouble With Condo Management White Mandevilla. It has no blooms yet, but it’s already got a vine that’s looking for something to latch onto and grow. If we leave it by the balcony railing, and it makes like kudzu, we’re gonna be reprimanded for messing up the uniformity of the building exterior. Better find some short poles.

■ In Over Our Heads Heirloom Black Diamond Watermelon. I had not heard of this breed of watermelon before and, for some insane reason, thought this was a miniature melon. Um … “the fruit grow from 30 to 40 pounds,” according to Google. “[It’s] the largest edible fruit grown in the United States.” Note to self: Find a trough. Replant.

■ Green Bell Sweet Pepper, another plant for whose future offerings we’ll have to wait a bit.

■ High Maintenance Begonia plant. “Don’t underwater. Definitely don’t overwater. Put in bright sunlight. Put in indirect sunlight. Depending on what type of begonia you have, you may have to ignore all of the above.” Whew, shoulda bought another succulent.

■ Never Seen Before/So Gorgeous I’m Afraid I’ll Murder Them Celosia. One guy mentioned in an online article that they look like something out of a Dr. Seuss book. Yeah. Unless someone like me cares a whole awful lot/These flowers are not gonna live. They’re not.

I figure this latest gardening venture will end one of two ways: 1. Our balcony will look like a modern-day Garden of Eden, complete with a little of our own food. 2. I’ll be tempted to wish I’d invested in one plant in particular: Marijuana.