When I first moved into my house, it had a huge garden in the backyard.

After we got moved in and settled, the neighbors told me that the previous owners had been prolific gardeners, and had even shared their bounty with the neighborhood. They loved being able to get tomatoes from right next door.

However, as a 23-year-old with a toddler around my feet and an infant on my hip, as well as a full-time job, I reassured them that they would have to run to the grocery store for tomatoes from now on because I wasn’t interested in gardening nathan!

It’s not just that I was busy raising kids, but I was convinced I had a brown thumb. (Ha!) I had never been able to keep a plant alive, despite my watering and attention. I determined it wasn’t for me.

But when my life slowed down a bit (read: my kids went to school full-time), I reassessed my views on plant life. I had managed to keep two children alive for 6 years. Why couldn’t I keep — at bare minimum — a succulent alive?

I started with one aloe, a plant that would also be useful with its medicinal gel, and named her Bunny, short for Abundance. (My best friend suggested it.)

I then bought three more plants and gave them names to represent what I wanted to harvest: Joy, Harmony, and Bliss. As they grew, I grew.

I discovered that to be a good plant mom, you need to cultivate a life of patience. Having multiple plants requires me to slow down, breathe deep and focus my attention on the matter at hand. While I’m repotting or misting or analyzing my plants for signs of distress, that’s the only thing on my mind. It’s one of the purest forms of self-care I know.

My plants are bigger and more beautiful and I love getting to know their little quirks as the seasons change. (My nerve plant, Sassy, for example, is a drama queen and needs moisture like a fiend.)

The more plants I brought home, the more I needed to learn about how to care for them. I turned to Instagram accounts like @BlackGirlsWithGardens to help me figure it out.

While I’ve seen a massive increase in the number of black women in love with houseplants and gardens over the past few years, driven in part by social media, black women in particular have been turning to the earth in droves since COVID-19 hit.

I went from 14 plants before March to 25 at last count. Plants have been one thing that are still accessible and add beauty and joy to an otherwise unpredictable time.

I recently popped into the Black Girls With Gardens Facebook group, where I saw they had 192 posts in ONE day. 2,000 new members in the past 30 days.

Even now, I can’t go a day without seeing a new plant purchase, a fledgling garden, a flowering garden.

A shift is happening. I see it. And I know you’ve seen it.

As black women have always had a connection to the earth, we’re revisiting our roots, similar to the natural hair wave of the past 15 years.

There’s something about sticking your fingers in the soil, of learning something new, of putting effort into something that will give you a beautiful return. It doesn’t always work (my attempt to grow cilantro from seeds this month was a bust!) but it’s all data. You learn and adapt for next time.

It’s meditative. It’s a safe space. It’s calming. It reminds us that just as we are gentle and patient with discovering how to take care of our plants, we need to keep that same energy when it comes to our own care.

“Being able to care for my plant babies gives me a sense of security, pride and most of all patience.,” says Chakayla Taylor, a 20something chef and plant enthusiast based in Charlotte, NC. Her Twitter stream is an endless parade of luscious plants — lemon balm, golden pothos, crotons and more.

Twitter: @ChakaylaJTaylor

“Deciding to bring nature inside my home and care for them can be a large task, especially since I have about 40+ plants (not including the babies I am propagating),” Taylor says. “All in all, I am up for the challenge because getting my hands dirty with repotting, planting, propagating, watering, harvesting rain water and honestly, studying each plant to assess what they need, has been a humbling experience nonetheless.”

Brittany Minor, an Orlando-area writer who runs @blackgirlgreenworld on Instagram, says she came to plants out of necessity.

Taylor agrees on the mental health benefits.

“Mentally, I am free,” she tells me. “I am free from a world of stereotypes, racism, sexism and any other negative -ism I refuse to entertain. I charge my plants (and my family) with love, positivity and most of all freedom. Just like our plants, there is not one way to love and care for them. It’s all up to the plant mother and father to care for them, according to what works for them. I love plants so much and I just want to share that joy with my people.”

Want some plants but don’t know where to start? Start with one plant. You’ll overwhelm yourself trying to learn the needs of multiple plants at once. After you get the hang of the care required for one, you’ll be able to add another one (or two) with greater ease. Use an app like PictureThis to set specific watering schedules and turn to a resource like BlackGirlsWithGardens.com.

Pick your first plant from this list: 11 Easy To Care For House Plants For Beginners

READ MORE