Bertram and Dehydration

 3/21      Coming off the high of the trip, I was so excited to return back and see my beloved child Bertram! Oh how I've missed his dear presence over these past two weeks!!! is what I would say if I remembered he existed.     Okay, maybe I am a neglectful parent but in my defense, I have a very short attention span and if I'm not constantly paying attention to something, I'll most definitely forget about it. All that to say, I forgot about Bertram. It wasn't until I got a message from Faith that I was reminded of his existence and my responsibility over him.  me being a bad parent      It's shameful for me to admit this but even after receiving this message, I would immediately forget about my oversight and not water him for another two days. When I did go over to the dining room to water him though, I noticed that he was still kicking! The leaves near the soil were either dead or dying, but the green and new sprouts looked very promis...

3/14        Up until now, Bertram has had no real obstacles in his life. All he does is sit, drink water, and absorb sunlight: the ideal life. But that was all about to change with s pring break coming up. Not only was I leaving to go back to Miami, my friend had invited me and my fellow classmate Faith on a road trip to Atlanta, meaning that even if I did take Bertram home with me, he'd still be dehydrated for minimum of 4 days, so I might as well just leave him in Gainesville, right?  me and faith deliberating on what to do with our children     I genuinely had to think hard about this for a while and in the end, I did what I considered the best option: absolutely drench Bertram in water and pray to God that the water won't drown him and keep him alive for a week or two.      While pouring record levels of water in Bertram's pot and watching it overflow onto the counter, my faith in him surviving the break wasn't very high. The concern...

3/9     Bertram keeps getting taller and taller every day -- at the rate he's growing, he'd be taller than me by Fall 2025. There's not much else going on with him, he's honestly just there most of the time.     Since I spent the majority of my time either outside my dorm or in my room, I actually rarely get to see Bertram besides the few times a week I attend my lectures and even then, he's so far away from the door that I don't bother taking the extra few steps and seconds out of my day to check on him. Maybe this makes me a bad parent.  baby update!       This might be a bad omen as to how Bertram will hold up in the future but, for now, he is alive and well!  

 3/3 bertram's little corner! taken 3/3     When I got back to my dorm, I initially didn't know where to put my plant. I live in Keys Complex, an apartment style dorm that I share with 3 other roommates. While I could place it on the windowsill in my room, I'm almost 100% certain that had I done that, I would've knocked the pot over and into my laundry hamper so instead, I put it in the dining area of our common area. Dr. Merchant stated that south-facing windows would be best in terms of sunlight but I had to make do with our east facing windows.  Airflow is much to be desired due to being indoors and there's not as much sunlight during the day as I'd like there to be due to the building design but lack of sunlight would end up being the least of Bertram's concerns anyways.      I actually remembered to take progress photos of Bertram and water him semi-regularly. He's growing steadily and his then-ugly brown leaves have now turned into a nice crisp s...