A tropical plant that grows as shrubbery in the tropics, or even as close to you as Nawlins. This is your best choice in houseplants, in my opinion. It's easy to grow, hard to kill, lives forever if you aren't a houseplant murderer, and will get so big and beautiful that you may be living in its house before it's over. Also a very mystical plant, in my experience. Here's what happened:

I'm all into this weird mind over matter reading material and I think there may have been substances involved at the time (don't pin me down here), but I'm alone in the room with my Selloum when it was just a baby. Maybe 7 or 8 big leaves from one trunk. It's a crisp fall afternoon and the air is electric with newness; you could smell the newness of the air. I try an experiment. I put my hand above one of the big leaves on the Selloum. I am not touching the plant, nor is there any window open around us. I just have my hand hovering about 3" above the leaf. I move my hand up 6" or so and will the leaf to rise. It does. It rises exactly the space I move my hand. I've got to tell you, it literally scared me almost to death, even though I acted as if I knew that was exactly what would happen.

I've still got that plant, 30 years later, and it's much larger now, as am I. I love that plant like a member of my family, but I've never tried that little test again. I don't want to know. You know?

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