Goodbye Tangerine 🍊, Hello Pineapple 🍍
A Sweet Farewell to 2024 ✨
Reporting the Weather
We’re in the dazed and confused part of the winter season here in South Florida, where one day brings 80-degree sunshine, and the next drops us into 45-degree nights. On those colder evenings, I’ve taken to tucking my soursop tree under a blanket to keep them warm. As a New Yorker, you’d think I’d be used to this, but like my soursop tree, I have hot island blood coursing through my veins and am sensitive to cold snaps. I’m sure my neighbors find me a bit zany, carefully arranging the blanket over my baby tree while wearing a puffy winter jacket as if I’m in the Northeast.
New here? Get to know me through these dispatches…
For wise words as you go into the new year, read: Didn’t Ya Know You Have Everything You Need?
For the latest update on my garden, read: Healing My Climate Anxiety Through Gardening
For some background on how I got here, read: My Gardening Journey Started Long Before I Sowed My First Seeds
Letting Go
I hope you’re preparing for the New Year in whatever way suits you best. Every year, I engage in a handful of rituals that help me reset: deep cleaning my space, setting and planning goals, or simply spending time with family and friends. This year, I’m doing all of the above, plus one more practice I’ve grown to cherish: the intimate art of letting go.
Ever since I turned thirty, I’ve been doing an internal audit of all I hold onto—mentally, physically, and spiritually. It’s my way of stepping into each new year feeling lighter and freer. In just two years of this practice, I’ve shed so much mental weight that now I mostly focus on the little burdens I pick up along the way.
Which brings me to the news I want to share: Today, I finally dug up and threw away the Honey Tangerine tree I planted almost two years ago. It’s been a small weight silently growing in volume in the background—to the point of literally becoming dead weight. Queue Solange’s “Cranes in the Sky.”
The Little Honey Tangerine Guild That Could
My side yard garden is where the Honey Tangerine tree stood. It was one of the first four trees I planted, and thinking back to the day I purchased it, I remember feeling overwhelmed at the Jack & The Beanstalk nursery. My friend and I had gone together; she’d done all her research and had a clear plan for her garden, while I was just thrilled to have a yard of my own. I had a vision of a tropical paradise and let my imagination run wild as we walked through rows of plants with tags that promised sweet, tangy, and bitter flavors.
$475 later, I was on my way to becoming a tropical gardener! When the trees arrived, I randomly selected spots for each one—no plan, just vibes (a rookie mistake I’ll never make again). The Carrie Mango became my prized specimen at the front corner, the Honey Tangerine near my office window for its fragrant blooms, the Avocado tree not far off, and the Julie Mango in front of my bedroom window to remind me of home.
In hindsight, the Honey Tangerine was awkwardly placed, but it was the guild I poured the most attention into. That first season, tiny lime-like rounds appeared on its branches, and pollinators flocked to its flowers. But something wasn’t quite right. The leaves turned from bright green to yellow, some branches dried out, and the tree seemed… off.
Perhaps it was my amateur gardening or my overly ambitious guild building. I’d planted it with lemongrass, Mexican sunflowers, and chaya, thinking I was doing next-level permaculture. In reality, I was overcrowding the space. I eventually moved those plants elsewhere, but by the second harvest season, the tree’s blight had worsened. To make matters worse, monstrous caterpillars moved in, devouring what little greenery remained.
After consulting a master gardener, I learned the tree likely had citrus greening, a disease that reduces yields and eventually kills the tree. She recommended treating it with imidacloprid, a synthetic insecticide applied every 90 days. I did one application but couldn’t bring myself to continue. I wanted to be an organic gardener; using this solution felt like a betrayal of my principles.
By late spring, I made a last-ditch effort, planting milkweed and nasturtiums around the tree to lure pests away, but the scorching Florida summer killed those crops before they could take effect. It was time to accept the truth: my Honey Tangerine tree wasn’t meant to be in my garden.
Removing it stayed on my to-do list for over six months. Every time I admired my garden, the tree stood there as a reminder of what could have been. In my procrastination, I imagined countless replacements for the space—banana trees, a wildflower patch, maybe an herb spiral. But I could never decide.
Finally, today, I dug it up. The task was quick, but the release was profound. The “mental cloud” of this tree—joy, anticipation, anxiety, dread—simply cannot follow me into 2025.
Clearer Skies Ahead
In the Honey Tangerine’s place, I’ve transplanted three pineapple plants from my backyard, creating a new patch. Based on what I’ve learned about growing citrus here in South Florida, I’ve let go of the dream of fresh, organic Florida citrus from my garden. Come next summer, I’ll hopefully be enjoying a sugarloaf pineapple instead.
As I look at my new pineapple patch, I’m reminded that every ending holds the seed of a new beginning.
What are you ready to let go of to make space for your verdant future?
Wishing you a happy New Year and a prosperous 2025!
With love,
Jess
Gardening is such an experience of trial and error and I’m glad you’re rolling with the punches!