The first time I ordered a plant online, I was living in a basement apartment in Toronto with windows so small they might as well have been air vents. "This," I thought to myself while scrolling through images of lush philodendrons and towering fiddle leaf figs, "is either going to be the beginning of a beautiful relationship or the most expensive way to kill something since my sister's brief foray into pet ownership."
My sister once bought a hamster that cost twelve dollars. The cage cost forty. The little hamster wheel, the special food, the colorful tubes that the creature could crawl through – another sixty. Two weeks later, the hamster escaped and was eaten by the neighbor's cat. "At least someone got their money's worth," my father said.
But I digress.
Large indoor plants
The plant arrived on a Tuesday, a day when nothing good ever happens. Except this time it did. The delivery person struggled up my narrow staircase with what appeared to be an entire rainforest wrapped in brown paper. "Sign here," he said, thrusting a digital tablet at me while balancing the potted jungle against his hip.
I hadn't realized how much space a six-foot Monstera deliciosa would take up in my apartment. Where my coffee table once stood, there was now a leafy canopy. I couldn't see my television anymore, which turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Instead of watching reruns of shows I'd already memorized, I found myself staring at my new roommate, amazed at how something so inherently dramatic could also be so calming.
Large plants low light
"You need to get more," my friend Janet said on her first visit after The Plant (which is how I'd begun to refer to it) had moved in. "Look at this corner over here. It's perfect for something that thrives in low light."
"Does anything actually thrive in low light?" I asked. "Besides mushrooms and regret?"
Turns out, yes. ZZ plants, snake plants, pothos – all members of what I've come to call the "Basement Dwellers Club." Plants that have evolved to survive in the shadowy corners of Toronto apartments where the sun makes only brief, ceremonial appearances.
Large plants and pots
The pots are what get you. Nobody tells you this when you're starting out. You see a plant listed for sixty dollars and think, "That's reasonable for something that produces oxygen and doesn't need to be walked twice a day." Then you realize you need a pot, and not just any pot – a proper pot with drainage holes and a saucer and preferably some kind of aesthetic value since it's going to be occupying prime real estate in your home.
I once spent more on a pot than I did on shoes that month. The shoes gave me blisters. The pot never complained once.
Large plants delivered
The delivery people of Toronto's plant shops deserve their own appreciation day. They navigate narrow hallways, tight staircases, and the occasional territorial cat with the grace of ballet dancers and the strength of Olympic weightlifters.
"How's the fourth floor walkup treating you today?" asked Mikhail, delivering my third large plant in as many months. We were on a first-name basis by now.
"About the same as your knees, I imagine," I replied, watching him maneuver a peace lily the size of a small car through my doorway.
"This is nothing," he said. "Last week I delivered a 12-foot palm tree to a penthouse. The elevator was broken."
Large plants cat friendly
My neighbor's cat, Stevie (the same one who had enjoyed the hamster buffet years ago), had taken to visiting whenever my balcony door was open. She would walk in, ignore me completely, and then settle beneath my Boston fern, occasionally batting at the fronds when they moved in the breeze.
"Is this safe?" I texted my neighbor, attaching a photo of Stevie lounging beneath the plant like some miniature jungle cat.
"Probably safer than the houseplants I have," she replied. "Mine are all killing machines, apparently."
I hadn't realized how many common houseplants are toxic to cats. I found myself researching "large plants cat friendly" at 2 AM, determined to keep both my green collection and my feline visitor safe.
Large plants online
Shopping for plants online is dangerous in the same way that online dating is dangerous. The photos always show their best angles, the descriptions promise low maintenance and high reward, and you never quite know what you're getting until it shows up at your door.
"This one's just going through a transition period," said the customer service representative when I called about my new palm that had arrived looking less like a tropical paradise and more like a bundle of straw. "Give it time to adjust."
I gave it time. It gave me brown leaves. We compromised by meeting somewhere in the middle – it's now half-dead, which I choose to interpret as half-alive.
Large plants easy to care for
"The key," my mother told me over the phone, "is to find plants that thrive on neglect. Like men."
My mother has been divorced three times and has kept the same jade plant alive for twenty-seven years.
The jade sits in her kitchen window, occasionally gets water when she remembers, and somehow continues to grow with the persistent determination of someone who wasn't invited to the party but showed up anyway and is having a great time.
I've since adopted her philosophy, filling my apartment with plants that don't require daily misting or humidifiers or special fertilizers imported from exotic locations.
Large indoor trees
There comes a point in every plant enthusiast's journey when they consider bringing an actual tree into their home. Not a tree-like plant, but an honest-to-goodness tree.
"It's perfectly normal," the plant shop owner assured me as I stood, mesmerized, in front of a fiddle leaf fig that was taller than my father. "Everyone reaches this stage eventually."
"What's the next stage?" I asked, already reaching for my credit card.
"Getting a second one because the first one looks lonely," she said with the confidence of someone who had seen this story play out countless times before.
As I write this, I'm sitting in what used to be my living room but now more closely resembles the botanical gardens. The air is cleaner, my mood is lighter, and my bank account is considerably emptier.
But as my neighbor said when she came over to retrieve Stevie yesterday, "It's cheaper than therapy and prettier too."
She's not wrong.
