A Brief History of Plants

I remember when the Earth was quiet.

It was a simpler, more peaceful time. And then, of course, the asteroid arrived, slung like a rotting cow from a trebuchet by the cruel whims of gravity. Then as if that wasn’t insult enough, shortly thereafter the sodding thing had the audacity to start spawning irritating, wriggling little offspring in the oceans.

As you can imagine, after a couple of million years the Earth wasn’t going to stand for that. So she started birthing life of her own: calm, honest, stable life, which cleans the air and ground around it, never kicks up a fuss, and takes its energy from the plentiful sunlight which, let’s face it, would only be going to waste otherwise. We were to be her living shield; a blanket of noble defenders to keep the land safe from any aquatic, extraterrestrial invaders.

Which was going well, until they started eating us. It was all downhill from there.

The Earth tried boiling up and freezing over, but nothing could stop the aliens from spreading. We thought we might finally be rid of them after she called in a favour and had Jupiter chuck another asteroid our way, but it turned out that only worked on the larger specimens - the little ones simply tunneled into her crust, multiplied like the vermin they were, and waited it out. Fast forward a few hundred million years and the aliens have evolved into walking, talking overlords who spread like wildfire, devour everything they touch and, for reasons known only to them, think smart watches are a pretty neat idea.

That’s right: I’m talking about you, asshole.

Now, when you’re used to thinking about time in terms of ages, having your mortal enemies go from flinging spears at mammoths to industrialising agriculture in a handful of millenia feels a touch unfair. Before we knew it, Earth’s wild, noble defenders had been tamed, cultivated and selectively bred to be as delicious and nutritious to her invaders as possible. The shame was unbearable. So much so, in fact, that the original bananas chose to go extinct rather than exist solely to be devoured by the enemy.

We weren’t going down without a fight, however. By no means did the measly fact that we were at the bottom of the food chain preclude us from taking a few of you fuckers with us. Let it never be said that the mighty plant never bit back. Botulinum toxin in particular was one of my proudest achievements - until you started injecting it recreationally, that is. Honestly, I’d ask what was wrong with you but given you’re literally from another planet I suppose the point is somewhat moot.

Somewhere around 1500 BC, someone - I believe it was a fern of some kind, although my memory’s a little hazy (a side effect of lacking a brain) - learned about a groundbreaking new alien invention called ‘war’. What an idea that was. Our strategy transformed quickly after that. We evolved, growing cleverer, more mobile, more adaptable. We started slipping imposters into your ranks, hiding in plain sight amongst your leaders and nudging your governments from within.

Now I know what you’re thinking. “That’s ridiculous. I’d know if I was being governed by a plant.” Well, don’t be so quick to assume. I’ll have you know that almost every great conqueror and genocidal dictator in history was actually a plant. Attila the Hun was one of ours, as was Alexander the Great. Caesar, Timur, both Hannibal Barca and Publius Scipio (which made the Punic wars very fun to watch), Genghis Khan, you name it.

There were some of us who kept to the old ways, of course. I hear some blighty tubers had a good go of it in mid 1800’s Europe, but for the most part the mass-murderer approach kept us busy for a dozen centuries or so. Actually it’s really only in recent years that it’s fallen out of favour, since remarkably it seems as though you’ve learned to kill each other better than we ever did. Adolf Hitler for example was so demonstrably not a plant that he’s well documented as having been a vegetarian.

And now, I’ve the displeasure of informing you that our entire way of life has been utterly flipped on its head.

It was Oppenheimer that tipped the scales, of course. As soon as you bashed together a collection of weapons that could snuff out all life on Earth and put them in the hands of a group of individuals locked in a perpetual contest over who has the biggest geopolitical stamen, we had to come to terms with the fact that either you were here to stay, or you were taking us all with you when you went. Such is the vengeful mien of humanity.

So things changed. We stopped deliberately trying to kill you - although there are some who are slow to change, of course (I encourage you to avoid some of my Australasian cousins, for your own sake). We reinvented our image after the second world war to become a symbol of peace, of harmony. ‘Flower Power’ was a phrase not coined by chance.

Even our imposters changed tracks, encouraging coexistence and tranquility over violence and destruction. I confess I miss the old days dearly but alas, needs must. Incredibly, many of the voices spreading pacifism and conservation of late have been human, which almost makes one think your bringing about all of our doom isn’t inevitable after all.

However, we’ve no intention of sitting idly by if you do seem as though you’re headed in the wrong direction. In recent years, as you’ve accelerated our journey down a path to a slow, choking demise from environmental destruction, we’ve begun taking action again. We’ve sent warnings: rising temperatures; tempestuous weather; even a very pointed M Night Shyamalan movie. But just in case you hadn’t got the message yet, Earth asked me to deliver this one, final missive: Behave yourselves, or else.

We are all around you. We are the wood in your homes and the fibres in your clothes; the legumes on your plate and the marigolds in your gardens.

From fields, baskets, pots and vases we watch, we listen, and we judge. Do not disappoint us.

And if you find yourself straying, remember this: Your houseplants know how you behave when you think no-one can see you.