These are NOT Morels (ha, ha, ha!)

I've already written about morels in this blog, but--well--here we go again.

It’s been three weeks since I last returned from Chimayo, two gallons of fresh-picked morels in a basket on the floor of my car. It was the fourth time I’d foraged this spring, and the most successful outing yet.

At home, I promptly violated the second rule of mushroom hunting: I bragged to everyone I knew about how, yet again, I’d used my outdoor savvy to discover another stash. Feeling very generous and 'Christian,' I called a friend and offered her family a portion of my treasure. Of course, I also wanted her to see exactly how talented I am at finding those elusive and well-camouflaged gems, and (just an eentzy-weentzy bit) to rub her nose in my good fortune. After all, she'd never found any morels.

On the other hand, she’s a master chanterelle picker. Every autumn she and her husband disappear for days at a time, roaming around the wet, west side of the mountains, clothed head to toe in old, mismatched Goretex. She told me last year the two of them picked 40 pounds of chanterelles in one weekend. She was gloating, actually, and if she had ended that conversation with ‘neener neener neener,’ it wouldn’t have surprised me. Okay, so she did give me a small bag of those chanterelles—but after just having picked 40 pounds, you’d think she could have thrown in a few extra for good measure. And do you think she told me where she found them? Are you out of your mind? OMG, when I asked, she clammed up like I’d asked her to testify about the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa. Pissed me off.

This past week, my parents spent a few days out at Chimayo. They wanted to try their hand at the morel thing and asked where they should go to find them. Feeling very generous and Christian, I described in great detail the exact bend in the road, the exact little stream bed, where I’d had my best luck. After all, weren’t there enough mushrooms in the world for everyone? And what was the problem with my friend, anyway? Far be it from me to be so selfish!

Then I hung up the phone and cursed myself—how could I be so stupid? It was clear I had just violated the first rule of mushrooming: never, ever, reveal the truth. Now my parents would rape and pillage my secret stash, probably blab all over town so that next year my little bend in the road would be clogged with a city-sized traffic jam of morel hunter-wannabees. Damn. I hoped every last mushroom in the entire Okanogan was already dead . . .

Turns out I had some luck. Last week the Forest Service was dropping hay bales from helicopters to mulch the slopes burned by the Tripod fire and had closed 'my' dirt road. My parents couldn’t get anywhere near the place I’d described—wee ha!! I'm going out to Chimayo in two days and the morel season lasts until the end of July, if it doesn’t get too hot and dry (pssst—don’t tell anyone my secret spot includes a year-round spring.)

And don’t expect me to be so generous and Christian next year.

Photo by v. sakata:
mushrooms, enchantment lakes; Alpine Lakes Wilderness, WA

Emergence

POPPY

for my two teenagers

Crimson silk
Confined
Inside an egg of celadon.
June warmth; June rain:
Both work to split the shell.
In an afternoon, life changes.





Fragile petals --wrinkled; new--
Unfurl
And reach toward sunshine.
Transparent, first,
Then rich with color.
A promise, straight and tall.





On the ground the faded husk
Turns brown and curls;
Old pieces cast aside.
But there, below,
The husk remains
In case it's ever needed.

Photos:
icelandic poppy, unfolding, my neighbor's yard; Seattle, WA
icelandic poppies, my neighbor's yard; Seattle, WA
poppy, full bloom, my neighbor's yard; 6/07

Fire and Rain

Last July, this forest fire--which ultimately consumed 274 square miles of the Okanogan National Forest--began directly across from Chimayo, at the top of Blue Buck Mountain.

It had been a 100-degree day on the eastern slope of the North Cascades and as evening approached, the thunderheads gathered. We sat on our porch, eating chilled watermelon; hoped a rain storm would drop the temperature so we could sleep. Instead, on the opposite side of the Chewuch River, a single lightening bolt struck the tinder-dry mountain top.

It wasn't until the next afternoon--a 110-degree day--that the fire made itself known. Mike and I were floating in inner tubes down the Methow River, in a vain attempt to stay cool, when the plume of smoke became visible. A mushroom cloud, like a mini-Hiroshima, boiled above the trees and spread across the sun-baked sky.

We are not (yet) permanent residents of the Methow Valley but those that are were visited with a three-month plague of choking smoke, not to mention pervasive anxiety. Would the wind direction change? And if so, would it be enough to blow the fire west, over the ridge and down into the Chewuch?

Every morning the sky was clear, yet the sun rose like a bloody eye; remained veiled by smoke until mid-afternoon when the wind blew the soot from the air. It was hot, and stinky; it was impossible to do anything outdoors. Wipe your table top: soot. Pick squash from the garden: soot. Brush your dog: soot. Turn on your windshield wipers: soot. Every surface was coated with ash and people left the valley--drove west, over the mountains--to escape. The fire spread north and east, through the Okanogan and into Canada, devoured a huge chunk of the Pasayten Wilderness. The northern terminus of the Pacific Crest Trail was shut down; the mountains we claim as our rightful backyard became sinister; off-limits.

In October, it finally rained. A week later, it snowed. Hundreds of fire fighters that had rallied from all over the west mopped up their operations and headed home (let me tell you, these guys are the best--year after year, they put their own dreams at risk, to save ours. Thank you!!) With the coming of winter, the fire snuffed out.

It's spring, now--summer, almost . . .
In the thick of things, it's hard to believe that so much life depends on fire's destruction. Ponderosa pine seeds, hidden deep in their gnarly cones, will not germinate unless they reach a temperature only achievable by fire. And morel mushrooms--for which you will pay $20.00/pound in any market--sprout in our northwest mountains only after our forests have been burned. I have been fortunate to reap the bounty of nature's destruction. Tiny streams, trickling down singed slopes; windfall trees, killed by fire's heat, provide the shelter and nutrition needed for the elusive, and delicious, morel.

Last summer, everything tasted like smoke. This spring, everything tastes of fungus. Morels, in my world, are a sign of new life.

Photos:
tripod fire at sunset, blue buck mountain; Winthrop,WA
tripod fire, blue buck mountain; Winthrop, WA
smoke and sun, tripod fire; Winthrop, WA
black morel mushrooms, my kitchen; Seattle, WA