The fittonia waylaid me ten years ago in a world that was unimaginably without gardening, or any knowledge of it. I was charmed by a plant that I suspected had stolen the silver-green netting off the skin of a water snake and slithered out to captivate me. It cost Rs 75, and my friend, my world’s best potato salad maker and scarily expert gardener told me not even to think about it. “The fittonia is very difficult to grow and for novices it is not the right choice.” But the fittonia decided to coax me with more silver-green paint work and I succumbed.
That sad first year of my learning to garden, 98 per cent of all the free cuttings I got from my friend, died out of sheer terror, overwatering and ignorance. One sad day, the fittonia vanished too! But on a dismal day when rainwater slashed Bangalore, I came home with my Scooty almost floating through three feet of rainwater, while two kind angels dressed as men in motorcycles, pushed me homewards.

But amazingly, adorably, as my scooty and I trudged wearily through the water-logged garden, the Rs 75 Snakeskin Stealer fittonia was waiting for us in its pot. It had survived! Under the shivering, icy, dread-filled evening skies, it put out a homecoming glow of silver-green magic! And in the following weeks, like Topsy, it grew and it grew and it grew! It made me love all green and silver water snakes, and all plants that topple expert advice! 

Now the same fittonia is growing in the very same pot, and has created fresh new riches inside glass bottles, atop pretty yellow, red and brown kettles and wherever else I have dispatched it for more riches. The fittonia also mystically filters out the doleful dribbles of dread and dismay that life sometimes pours out. It paints my day with pleasure within seconds of drooling over its riches that have accumulated from Rs 75 to Rs 7500 and more!
The fittonia will vanish when I most expect it to flourish. Its flourishing compost eerily is my carpet of worrisome woes, the world’s bullying and badgering. It will return whenever I am crumbling, to gift me with the sparkling solace of the silent world.