Letter of Recommendation: Pothos

With houseplants, I recommend taking the complete opposite philosophical approach. Stop thinking of them as some sort of pet, and start thinking of them as longer-lasting, less expensive cut flowers.

When you buy a plant you set yourself up for failure. They've been raised in ideal conditions, aggressively grown, and then shipped to a store (looking at you, Home Depot) that abuses them. Even if you buy from a quality purveyor, you still bring your new plant home to a new, not ideal and likely shocking environment.

Unless your conditions are good and your care optimal, the plant will go through a slow decline, maybe over weeks, maybe months. At some point it will look bad: brown, or leggy, or leafless.

Here's the radical concept: throw it out (compost it, if you can) or give it to someone with a plant-rescue complex. Buy a new one, and enjoy it until it, too, doesn't look attractive anymore. There's no shame in this. In fact it's psychologically better for you. A home (or office) filled with scraggly, wan, sickly plants is depressing. Why surround yourself with things that make you feel like a failure?

No one thinks twice about buying cut flowers and tossing them after a few days when they look bad. With a houseplant purchase, you get a lot more bang for your buck and the benefits of greenery in your environment. Just stop thinking of them as pets, and think of them like those tulips you buy in March: beautiful...but temporary.

I got a pothos cutting in 2003 and planted it in my yard in Florida...they're not kidding about the 40 foot vines, I'm sure it would reach even higher on a tall enough tree. The leaves get really massive, too.

Loved the article. I'm sure Mrs Obama would be pleased flattered and amused. Try begonias. They're easy but they also bloom something poor old pothos cannot do. If you want to be loved needed and cared for there are lots of little Michelle kittens waiting for you at the SPCA.

For what it's worth I am from Generation X. I was a gay kid growing up in North Carolina and dove into the silent and beautiful world of plants to protect myself from the brutality of growing up gay in the South.
I obsessed over my mother's pothos and never stopped acquiring and killing plants ever since. Decades of trial and error is what makes a green thumb.
For every gorgeous house plant that I have, there are 3 that never made it. Get many different kinds of plants in your space, and keep the 25% that look good. I tell my friends "I am running a modeling agency here, not a soup kitchen for plants."

In a few more decades you may graduate to keeping orchids and bonsai too, but please do not name them after people, famous or not, with unintended consequences.

Love the photo!

I am now retired, but during my long career in various offices of the State of Michigan, I found that a pothos was the perfect office plant. Indestructible, easily relocated, easily divided, and easily given away when necessary. The ultimate cubicle farm accessory.

"Often, people hang them up or sit them on windowsills, letting the tendrils spill down to the floor."
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Tendrils are the thin strands on the stems of some plants (like grapes) that wrap around objects to support the vine. Pothos plants do not have tendrils.

Wow! I never had the slightest idea what it's called. Thanks.
You can cut the end off, 10-12 inches, and stick it in some soil and get another. And where you cut two new branches will grow.
I think I must have gotten some from my mother or sister, decades ago. It'll outlive all of us.
For your next trick I recommend spider plants.

I am praying daily that our 'pothos' survives; it was on our balcony and having many yellow leaves (too much sunlight), so we brought it indoors and placed it on this plant stand near the balcony's window and I am still very afraid that a week or two is all that I can have it for; I only wish the leaves were a darker green; meaning more durable. I am incapable for growing/nurturing things but maiming of them. I simply don't know how to do anything right, ever.

I have had pothos plants for years and, as the article suggests, they have thrived with minimal help--but in the past year, I've had one that keeps getting sicker and sicker, losing more and more leaves. I'm about ready to just toss it, but I'm still wondering what I did wrong. Sugggestions?

I've got a Dracaena marginata, a similarly resilient type. I'm really grateful to it for allowing me to sustain a life and making me believe in myself. I love the smell it has right after I water it, which I did just now due to this article — so thank you from us both!

The naming and then death of "Michelle Obama" is in such bad taste and in no way essential to this story. " After Michelle's death..." beyond creepy.

Just like pothos, here are a few other house plants who can survive millennial (or any adult for that matter) neglect.
Spider plant or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chlorophytum_comosum
Lucky bamboo and ribbon plant
Papyrus and paper reed
Begonia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begonia
Geranium or crane's bill
These are very forgiving and very giving.

I'm glad that you have found happiness in your houseplants. I would hesitate to call this a millennial thing, as I think between ages 18-34 is a very common time in EVERY generation for people to start digging, whether indoors or out.