Five Years Of Jade

We’re about to get out and have summer fun with family all day, and I hope you do too, but first, just a quick little note on this fine, fine, Saturday. I woke up reminiscing about something special: My move to Rochester, which happened 5-years ago today.

Here I am with my sister (affectionally referred to as) Anniepants outside of my first apartment. She’s done cool things in the last 5 years too, like graduating high school, college, and going on to become a real-stinkin’-life cowgirl. You can read her blog too if you want.

My 5-year-iverssary also means that I started my first career-driven job 5 years ago tomorrow. Wowzers.

And totaled my Dad’s car 5 years ago from Tuesday. That’s a story for another day on another blog.

Anyways, I moved out of my parents home near Buffalo, NY and into my first post-college apartment on July 16th, 2006. It was 90-degrees, and the house beside the Memorial Art Gallery was un-air-conditioned, and nothing but gross and shady… as you’d expect all slumlord-owned last-minute-sublets to be. You see, I moved here quick-as-a-whip for my first real job that needed me to start pronto (the same gig that I left two months ago), so when it came to housing, I had to take what I could find. Luckily, I transitioned easily and I’m still friends with the girl who graciously took me in.

I also still have some of the random goodies I acquired in the short 1.5 months that I lived there. A dresser (that I rehabbed + really need to rehab once more), a floor lamp (that still stands in my living room), and a sweet little Jade plant that was in much need of a home.

I even found a photo of the Jade, circa February 2007, at which time I had been caring for the plant for nearly 6 months.

Aside from ambitiously-achieved advances and changes in living situations, this little plant is the best literal measure of my Rochester life. So, I made it a growth chart in documentation of its advancement.

When I installed the open shelving in the kitchen last December, the plant in its white IKEA pot was short enough to fit underneath the shelves, which is how I so easily recall its recent growth spurt, if you call 2″ over 7 months a spurt. The new branch was a surprise growth from last spring. So cute, I just want to pinch it’s rubbery little leaves.

I do wonder how tall it’ll grow and whether or not it will widen out at any point. I’d like to see it grow to be 3 feet wide by 3 feet tall, and I’m putting no limits on it’s abilities (just like the friends and coworkers who took me under their wing 5 years ago), so maybe I’ll really get to observe it in that state… by the time I’m 70.

Happy Saturday.