Marissa

She was not Marissa in those days. She was ‘a plant’ to keep alive.

Marissa.

She was a high-school graduation present for my son from the school after a four-year, two-and-a-half trillion dollar investment.

“Thank you for the tuition. Here is a diploma and a plant. Don’t kill it. Alumni Affairs will be reaching out Wednesday.”

There was some early engineering love for the plant that first carefree summer. My son built a solar-powered watering system that measured soil moisture and released dew-sized droplets of humidity as needed, like he was maintaining her in an induced coma.

I stared at this cyborg contraption on his desk in intimidation and disbelief, looked at it closely, and spotted a two-and-a-half trillion dollar price tag. From some other part of the house, my wife yelled up the stairs, “Honey, Alumni Affairs is on the line. Are you home?”

He lost interest in the plant, and carted off to England with dreams and a guitar for a tution-free (!) year on a student exchange.

At the airport outside of security during our goodbye-until-Christmas hugs, …