My first brush with the Tillandsia genus came on my birthday, many years ago. I was probably 12 or 13, and my love for plants was well-known to family and family friends. Elaine gifted me with my first, and thus far only, air plant. I distinctly remember standing next to her on our back terrace as the evening descended. She was on her way out, no doubt with Suzie in tow, and she was explaining to me how to take care of it.
I loved plants as much as I loved words, and it was equally enthralling to hear Elaine tell of the cultivation methods as it was to look upon the silver-grey foliage she held in her hand. She waved the little plant through the air and made a dunking motion, saying that the person from which she purchased it told her it just needed to be dunked in water once a week, or misted, and it would survive without pot or soil. Such magic was new to me; I’d never had a tropical bromeliad, and it sounded so simple and easy. The promise of a bloom was also enticing, held vaguely in the future if the happy growing conditions were met.
When I came upon the Tillandsia seen here in their whimsical head holders, I had to take a photo. It brought back such a happy memory, and I may have to find a few new plants (apart from that silly head contraption) for our collection.
