The Blog Continues

This is my first post-Nature Writing blog. For the last entry, see "Muddy Floody Rampy Joy", one entry below.

If you've made it this far, congratulations: you're now a reader of my non-academic nature blog. I cannot promise any regularity, nor can I vow to keep every entry Piedmont-centered. Those fornicating ducks in the backyard deserve an entry, after all.

To celebrate being almost-done, the weather threw for me a surprise party consisting of blue sky and 76 degrees. I got up early, I went to the store, I bought s'mores, and I just plain handled these men I live with. There was some uncertainty about an April overnight--it's a lot of work to go out there, not that any of them would know because I do it all--but my noon I had three men and two dogs in the car, and plenty of joie de vivre. I was psyched.

Ben made me put Flo Rida on the stereo on the way out and demanded that it be played on repeat until we arrived. ("Right Round" remix). When this finally happened

I quickly turned it off only to hear his stern little voice say, "Hey! AGAIN!!" Well, that shit doesn't fly in my house, little punker.

It's ramp season in West Virginia and Ohio. I've talked about the so-called "spring leek" before. They're delicious. They smell like a cross between onion and garlic, and they're both pricey and hard to come by in farmers' markets. At the lake, however, we have them growing like crazy.  

Ramps ahoy!

Shawn, being the foodie that he is, has been planning a ramp raid for a year, ever since he (an Ohioan all of his life until we married) learned about the WV tradition. We arrived, we hit the woods, and we dug. His plan was two-fold: we collected both ramps to eat and ramps to transplant back in our yard in a wet, shady spot where we *hope* they will grow. Hope.

I know, I know. Welcome to the gun show.

Yes, there's nothing more badass than a man who goes into
the woods to dig up wild leeks. You crazy, reckless man.

Ironically, whilst we were out hunting for spring leeks, Shawn took a spring leak. I have a photo, but since this is a public blog read by many of my respected peers, I cannot post it. Maybe later, after a glass of wine. In the photo he's peeing on a log, looking over his shoulder at me as I snap the photo. I've been known to do some cruel things to the poor man. For example:

I photoshopped this and put it on our Christmas card one year. And sent it to his boss. And his grandma. There was concern. Anyway, he's a patient man and we celebrate 10 years on April 30th. Amazingly.

On the hike back, I noted many, many trilliums. None had bloomed yet, but the three-leafed flower is unmistakable. (Not to be confused with the 3-leafed state flower of Ohio, the poison ivy.) I was feeling sad that they hadn't bloomed yet, as next weekend is supposed to be terribly cold and I won't have much desire to go out there. Then, I came upon this:

I believe this variety is known as "Stinking Benjamin". Ironic on so many levels.

Red trilliums aren't as common as the white and pink variety. And look at the stripes on the leaves! My God, it's gorgeous. A very delicate flower, it's easily damaged by feet or deer, and it absolutely musn't be picked. Trilliums are becoming rare around here, and this was surrounded by four other flowers of this color. I would see hundreds of trillium plants this weekend, not yet blooming, but only a few red ones, which seem to blossom early. I'm surprised. For years the trilliums have been sparse and we've been worried about them. Whether or not they will actually bloom is a different story.

Back on the deck, Spiderman wasn't having a good time. Ben has a thing about throwing his toys. And rocks. And his shoes. And his food.

Stinking Benjamin...

While Shawn and Andy fished, Ben and I went for a paddle. It was a nightmare. He insisted we bring his Spiderman pole, which I felt very nervous about considering how little grasp he has on the idea that there is a sharp hook at the end. Several times it almost went into my hand. And then, as we paddled, I managed to get it hooked in a tree. I saved the pole and the bobber, but the hook is forever lost in a bush.

Plus, who the hell can fish with this following your boat? She gets very concerned when she cannot make physical contact with her children, and I had one of them in my boat. So, she swam along with us, make sure that not a single bass or bluegill came anywhere near our bait. The German Shepherd has the biggest heart in the animal kingdom. She'd take a bullet for these children. 

And then it all went to hell. As I switched kids and paddled with Andy instead, I caught sight of Nugget on the shore with one leg tucked up, limping very severely. And I knew without even looking that she had a hook in her. This has never happened before, but then, we've never been stupid enough to fish with two little boys before. In fact, we couldn't find the hook for the longest time because it was entirely in her leg. The eyelet was sticking up and the rest of the hook, which had a total of three barbs (two on the shank), was fully buried. It was as bad as it could possibly be. I loaded the poor dog up, told the men I'd see them before bed, hopefully, and drove the dog back to Wheeling (an hour). On the ride she didn't utter a peep, but lay as still as death on the floor of the car, so still in fact that I had to poke her from time to time. 

I had intentions of sharing the story of the hook with you, but I'll condense it to a $775 bill and a very, very sad dog with a lampshade on her head. As she woke up from the anesthesia (it was bad enough to require surgery) I could hear her in the back, crying. At that point I would have bagged the weekend but the children were desperate to have the first overnight of the season, and so I drove a third hour back out to the lake with poor, poor Nugget, coned and sorrowful.

When I arrived, the kids had been fighting for hours and their father was cantankerous about it. Andy had admitted to leaving his pole lying on the ground and not knowing where his hook had gone. And Ben had kicked his brand new shoe into the woods and it was lost. He owned the shoe for 24 hours before it vanished into the Piedmont jungle. 

 Oh, and they hated the ramps.

It was a long night with Lamp Dog, who couldn't navigate doorways too well. At 5am I got up to pee, and Shawn got up to pee, and we let the girls out to pee. And then Shawn walked face-first into a door. I laughed so hard, and there's a bit of a dent in his head.

At 7am I gave up on sleep and stumbled out looking like this.

Ye Gods....that's awful.

Spiderman spent a quiet night on the roof. I refuse to get him down. There was a great chorus of "Andy threw my Spiderman on the roof!" followed by an echoing answer of "Ben told me to!" Screw Spiderman. Have a nice summer up there, buddy. 

Spiderman on the garage roof

Before anyone else woke up, I made my way back down to the lake, and stopped to see the trillium again. It struck me as the most gorgeous thing in the world, as though I would never see anything like it in this lifetime again. A forest angel.

I have yet to find a photo online of stripey leaves.

I had a second (third?) cup of joe down on the dock and watched the sun climb a bit. The wind had shifted from north to east, signaling an incoming front. Not a single fish was anywhere to be seen. They don't bite upon arrival of a cold front, ever. Toughest fishing in the world. That, and a full moon.

Guess in which decade my parents bought this mug? 

So instead I went back into the woods, in part to look for that damn shoe. And I went back to the frog pond, which is no longer a vernal pool but rather a puddle of muck. And behold, I encountered a vast wilderness of uncurling baby ferns. Hundreds. What a miraculous way to enter this world.

And the may apples are opening. 

And a white trillium is growing in, of all places, the dirt above the septic tank.

Last night, and yesterday, were a disaster. So terribly stressful. All I wanted was to escape Wheeling for a weekend, and find some inspiration for the final revision of my final paper. I've learned the hard way that sitting in front of the laptop all day and waiting for the words to come is a waste of time. They'll come when they come, and they're more apt to do so when I've had an experience out in nature. Well, I had a fucking experience out in nature. On four separate occasions I asked Shawn if we could just bag the overnight and go home, back to the internet and the paper waiting for me and the real world. I am so glad I didn't bag it. I slept with the windows open, with very cool air wafting over me, huddled under several blankets, wearing my mom's pajamas from 1983. This morning it was serene, and everyone had simmered down and was quiet and contemplative (except Ben, who discovered that the word "vagina" has a lovely echo when thrown into the woods against a birch stand). Nugget regained her strength, Maya hiked with me and found a ball. I saw a few deer in the woods (they're far more shy than our backyard deer), and found so many trilliums, and ferns, and may apples that my heart leaped, if you'll excuse the cliche. 

And I found myself terribly, terribly grateful for the blog assignment of this past semester. The patches of woods where I've been walking...I've been staring at them from the deck for 36 years, but because of the summer poison ivy and thorns I've never walked in them. I've stuck to the rough paths. This year I've been over every inch of those patches (mostly looking for a 4-year-old's Star Wars Croc) and seen new streams forming new ravines, and strange moss, and weirdo holes and funky fungi. I love April out there! I had no idea what was in the woods in April. It's the most amazing time of the year, when everything creeps back in, starting as a green carpet in sunny patches. 

We found the damn shoe under the bed.