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Basil, as most experienced gardeners will tell you, is a plant that lasts a season. After that, it is no good. All I can say is that I'm glad I didn't know this bit of basil trivia when I brought a clay pot with an aging basil plant into my front window one year.
I plopped it on the window sill and watered it as I would anything else (when it seems to look dry, I give it a drink). Every few weeks, I'd pick off the tops and use them in a sauce or salad I was making in the kitchen. In the winter, it wouldn't grow as fast, but it would pick back up in the spring. I kept this going for almost four years.
The tender stalk turned into a tough, tree-like trunk but the plant kept going, and I enjoyed fresh basil for quite a while. Then the gardeners found it.
Friends who knew better asked me about it. "How long have you had this?" they would say. "Four years" I responded. "Impossible!" they said. "Basil only lasts one season."
They questioned me. "Didn't the tops flower?" Well, no. I kept cutting off the tops. "Didn't it turn black in winter?" Uh, not really. It enjoyed being inside.
The strange thing is that once they told me that it couldn't be done, the plant let out a last gasp and faded away. Ignorance can be bliss, and provide you with fresh basil for years from the same plant.
Since then, many experiments have taken place. Can tropical plants do well in the northern zones? Ask my giant pineapple plant. I expect it to flower this year. Or the orange tree I started by putting the seeds from my breakfast into a spare pot.
Can you start a ficus tree just by cutting off a branch off an existing tree and sticking it in the dirt? Yup, and if you plant two you can, over time, train them to twist and spiral around each other.
My suggestion to you, fellow Black Thumbers, is to challenge the staus quo from time to time. Get your curiosity fired up, and see what happens when you attempt the impossible, implausible, or downright weird. Put seeds from your fruits and vegetables in some soil and see what comes up. Take an onion, or a potato, and plant it to see what happens. Keep a pot or two around just for this purpose.
If you are lucky, you'll have the pleasure of seeing your expriment grow and prosper. If you fail, well, it was only an experiment and it wasn't supposed to work anyway.
(PS. Don't tell serious gardeners what you are doing. Experience has shown that this can curse your attempts.)
Lesson 10: Four Year Basil And Other Oddities
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