My luck runneth out?

I have two of these lucky bamboos. The first (pictured) my Mum bought me for Christmas in 2004 after a trip to Greece where she noticed how they adorned many elegant Athenian apartments. This bamboo has survived two moves, living for many years on my bedside table, enjoying filtered sunlight and the company of hundreds of books.

The second I bought to bring some life to my very first office. It was the only time I ever had my very own office, with a door that shut. It may never happen again. The bamboo now lives in my study/studio and has coped admirably in both environments, particularly given the absence of natural light.

I can say with some confidence that my lucky bamboos did bring me luck, as Mum had hoped. They saw me through meeting my soulmate, domestic and world travel, getting married, several work opportunities, buying our dream home, finishing my thesis, my Dad surviving a serious health scare, our little 'un's birth, and countless other tiny moments of joy that would be too numerous to mention.

Except now my bamboos aren't looking quite so healthy. They are starting to yellow and slowly die, stalk by stalk. To be fair, this process takes a long time. My work bamboo, for example, has been dying over the past three years. Now there is only one healthy stalk left, although the two that are yellowing have taken the best part of this year to make their departure.

Being somewhat superstitious, I am given to wonder what this all means. I have a number of houseplants and I adore them all, but find the idea of the task of watering them tedious. [The actual watering doesn't take too long and is not all that labour intensive. That said, I have dropped from a fastidious weekly watering to an ad hoc fortnightly sploosh.] Nonetheless, the idea of not having this lush plant life providing elegant calm in my home and work space makes me feel sad and bereft.

But maybe a new chapter requires a new and different sort of luck.

And perhaps houseplants can be... just that.