At Least They're Committed

Melanie trounced past carrying a plastic vase with two lifeless stems protruding. Her dead orchid. I laughed; she said she didn’t understand how it could die. How could Walmart keep it alive and she couldn’t? I realized the square pot could be helpful as I look to re-pot my green, leafy vine-things. (No, I’ve never looked up what they are.  They’re common plants that have been doing uncommonly well in my office.) Anyway, Mel dug the dead orchid out of the trash for me and when we pulled the contents out of the pot, they came out in one great big chunk of non-earth. Some sort of Styrofoam or something with fake green moss on the top. I ripped the dead stems out of the “mulch” to find, sure enough, it was never a potted plant. It was cut at the base and stuck in the polystyrene. After all those weeks of trying to save the orchid, it turns out it wasn’t alive in the first place. A metaphor? I don’t know. You tell me.