Gardeners are nice people

Okay, maybe all gardeners aren't but, in my experience, it has seemed they are. There is just something about those who grow plants that makes them inherently nice as they desire to share their produce, their seeds, their knowledge. Perhaps close proximity to plants mellows one or is it the soil? Well whatever it is, over and over again, in my life, I have been blessed by their bounty.

In Palo Alto, at least the area where I was staying, the homes are generally moderate in size, craftsmen, Spanish in influence, bungalows-- their gardens lush with flowers and the streets narrow with often no sidewalk but many tall trees. I love it. This part of Palo Alto, a mile or so from Stanford University, has an aura of uniqueness, of intellect, of peacefulness-- even though only a few blocks off the busy El Camino Real.

The house to the right looked to be owner designed, maybe built, and to the right of it was a small set of pens for either goats, chickens or even sheep. Unoccupied at the moment, they looked well kept and ready for a future resident.

There are other Palo Altos-- the ritzy one, the poor one; but I am writing about the in between one. By in between, that doesn't mean inexpensive. Even small houses with little lots can easily run half a million dollars or more, but that doesn't mean it's not in between-- for where it is.

On this particular walk, I had headed out into the back streets and hadn't taken my camera. I got about three blocks from the motel and remembered it. Okay, I thought, it won't matter. What can I see that I just have to photograph? I found it one block farther and turned around. The day was hot. Did I mention that? I wasn't eager to go back to the motel, but I simply had to photograph these gorgeous, deep, deep red, almost exotic looking flowers. From a distance, from their colors, I had thought perhaps they were chili peppers but they were not.

As I was angling the camera for one more photograph, I heard the clear, masculine voice-- May I help you? He walked over from a side yard as I said-- yes, what are these flowers? I haven't seen anything like them.

I am not sure what he thought I had been doing; but as soon as he heard the question, he was eager to tell me all about them. Amaranthus, he said. No, they wouldn't be limited to the temperate region around Palo Alto. He felt confident I could grow them. Despite their height, they are annuals which will reseed every year. He said some might consider them weeds, but they are easy to control. They are also edible.

We talked awhile longer about this and that, and then he said, would you like some seeds? Would I like some seeds? I had been wondering whether my local seed store would have them, trying to remember the correct spelling he had told me. I was happy when he cut off a flower head, put it in a sack and even added a few seeds for a yellow amaranthus.

Later research online told me Amaranthus are also called Love-lies Bleeding. How could one not love a flower with such a name? They are used by the Hopi for their red dyes (possibly Navajo also as I see that same shade of red in my Navajo rug colored by natural dyes), were used by the Aztec in some of their ceremonies, and have appeared in poems. Whatever drew me down the right block to see them and brought that man out to take time to tell me about this beautiful plant, I have been enriched.

Gardeners are nice people.

Siskiyous

On the first day of autumn, I was on my way south, riding along with the farm boss as he changed hats for business meetings in the bay area.


Driving through the Siskiyou Mountains of southern Oregon and northern California is always beautiful-- always. These pictures are early morning on the first day of autumn and taken from the freeway in no particular order other than all in the Siskiyous.


The first snow frosted the tops of the hills, autumn colors appeared here and there. Soon this country will off and on be covered by a blanket of snow, and drivers will either negotiate the highway with traction devices or stay below until the roads are cleared.


There are road signs along some parts of the freeway indicating that section is maintained by State of Jefferson Chamber of Commerce. It is a sly reminder to those who drive past that many local residents would like to form their own state combining northern California and Southern Oregon, who both feel put upon by the larger cities in their states. Some here, however, would like to take the Pacific Northwest, which would include northern California above the Bay Area, and secede-- either joining with Canada or becoming their own sovereign nation. Remembering what happened to some southern states who thought likewise, this is more joke or pipe dream than serious ambition.

The Kingbird and the Solstice

When I realized that I would be in the Big Hole valley for the summer Solstice, I decided to make sure I could celebrate it at Big Hole National Battlefield. The story of the Nez Perce and Chief Joseph is pretty well known but not so many know of this place.

Sitting in the truck, the laptop plugged into the power source, I feel this land as strongly as I did the first time I happened upon it. This June 21st, the wind blows through the willows, the sun is hot. Snow is still on the mountains that encircle the valley. The banks of the Big Hole River are lush with tall grass. Moose graze on the willows (although I only heard it, didn't see it, and given they said it was with a calf, that was okay with me).

This place is sacred ground because of what happened here, but perhaps it was sacred from before that. Does an event leave behind it energy or did the event happen because of the energy already there? Whichever the case, August of 1877, the Nez Perce camped on the banks of the river, expecting a brief respite from being chased. Here they planned to graze their horses, bake Camas roots in the coals of their campfires, and let women and children rest.

They had been on the run for four months but felt relatively safe. As they had traveled through the Bitterroot Valley, following their traditional hunting trail, they even bought supplies from the settlers with gold. They had no idea that their safety was an illusion.

Although they had had a treaty with the United States government, that treaty like the many before it, was worth only the honor of those who had negotiated it. Pressure was brought to bear to take the Nez Perce land in Oregon's Wallowa Mountains. As the whites expanded across the United States, they wanted all Indians forced onto reservations of their choosing, not where the people had lived. The Nez Perce didn't want to die in captivity. They felt their only choice was to escape to Canada where they could still find safety and freedom. The United States government set out to stop them.

August 7th, 1877, 800 Nez Perce warriors, women and children and 2000 horses arrived at Iskumtsetalik Pah (The Place of the Buffalo Calf). Their chosen leader, Chief Looking Glass, decided the cavalry was far enough behind to give the people time to rest. It must have been so tempting. It still is to linger along the meandering stream, enjoying the beauty. Most of them would have remembered other, more peaceful times as they cut poles and erected their tipis.

Some were given dreams to warn them disaster awaited, but Chief Looking Glass ignored their premonitions.

"My brothers, my sisters, I am telling you! In a dream last night I saw myself killed. I will be killed soon! I do not care. I am willing to die. But first I will kill soldiers. I shall not turn back from death. We are all going to die!" Wahlytits

The soldiers attacked at dawn on August 9th and for the story of the battle, the tragic slaying of women and children, the survival of those who hid in the creek, who were protected by their parents' fierce fight, the capture by the Nez Perce warriors of the military's howitzer, you can find the stories on line at sites like Big Hole National Battlefield. It was a time of tragedy, one of great courage, monumental mistakes as well as the strength of the human spirit.

The Nez Perce who escaped continued to try to find freedom, but the United States government was equally determined they would not. It is a sad and not proud story of the American concept of manifest destiny that was repeated time and again across the West. Of the thousand treaties entered into by the United States, less than 100 were honored.

After many battles, and almost to the border with Canada, the surviving Nez Perce were stopped and forced onto two reservations, one in Washington and one in Idaho. They were never again permitted to live in their homeland. In an ironic twist there is a memorial to Chief Joseph, the Nez Perce's most famous leader, on Wallowa Lake. I suspect it's as much a tourist enticement as a real attempt to make right that which cannot be made right. They would not even allow Joseph (his birth name, Hin-mah-too-yah-lat-kekt, meant Thunder Rolling Down the Mountain) to buy land there when he requested it, and he died in exile.

Where the various tipis stood that day has been marked by those who came back later to recount the stories. In front of Chief Joseph's tipi poles, I took a silent time for reverence and gratitude. You can see by the prayer cloths tied to the poles how many others had felt the same things. I then noticed above me, on top of those tipi poles, had landed an Eastern Kingbird. It stayed the whole time, and I'd like to think it might have been an omen that it was right to pay respect to these people and their most famous leader, who people still remember for his words-- From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever.

Walking up the hill toward where the soldiers, who had originally thought to easily overcome the Nez Perce, instead fought for their lives, I got this photo which might be a little difficult to interpret. It is a bright blue dragonfly laying eggs. It seemed symbolic to me of new life.

As always, these photos are more impressive if they are enlarged by clicking on them. Imagine the wind blowing, the sun on your back. Do you hear that faint sound of children laughing and playing along the banks of the creek, the women gossiping as they gather roots? Or perhaps it's the sounds of the guns, the screams of the dying? Can you feel the energy of those who sacrificed their lives for others? Perhaps it's just the wings of a bird as it takes flight.

I am back in Oregon; post was written June 21st in the Big Hole valley.

Montana

It was 1991 the first time I saw Montana’s mountains looming above the freeway as I traveled east on I-90. The hills grew steeper as heavily timbered mountains seemed to go nearly straight to the rivers and creeks below. I felt a familiarity which went beyond the fact I had lived in the Pacific Northwest all of my life.

From the start, there was something in Montana that I knew; and as I visited historic places like Buffalo Jump where buffalo herds were driven off the cliffs to feed and cloth the Blackfeet, Salish, Shoshone and others, I wondered had I been here in a previous lifetime? I let myself feel the trails, the sky, and the hills. Was I here as a Lakota woman? Maybe Blackfeet? Or was it all imagination? Montana is a wonderful place for imagination.

I had traveled to a lot of places in the west but can't say why I put off coming to Montana until I was 48. I think I expected it to be another Oregon or Washington. In one sense, it is-- only with faster and bigger rivers, steeper mountains and less people—although the less people part is changing fast. Because of its history, the wildlife roaming free, the people who value freedom more than some places-- it's not like anywhere else I have been.

Those first trips were the years where sleeping in the van was my kind of camping. Curtains quickly clipped in place, pads and sleeping bags laid out and it was easy to stay anywhere for a night; however, Montana taught me the fallacy of that thinking one summer when I thought a fishing access site along the Yellowstone River would be lovely. It was-- except for the flies. I have never, to this day, had more flies descend from nowhere. It was like a horror move, only The Flies instead of The Birds, and rapidly led to changing where to sleep that night.

Montana has a way of doing that—revising plans. Head up a trail and see a young moose carcass partly eaten or find still steaming bear scat (big enough to be grizzly) and hiking plans change. The days when I came here with the freedom to vagabond were the most fun. Go somewhere and if the fishing was good, you stay. If it isn’t, you go where the river is higher or lower or the hatch had just erupted-- and those insects do seem to erupt. I am always on the outlook for streams with round rocks where I can wade looking into the water, along the beaches, staying downstream from the fishermen, but turning over a lot of rocks to find that nearly perfect round shape.

When I try to think of one main thing people seek when they come to Montana, I am not sure. Yes, there is Yellowstone, Glacier, the Little Big Horn, but I think most come for the experience of the wild, the feeling of freedom. You find that experience when you see bear tracks along a river, or are hiking a trail to a waterfall, sometimes even along a freeway when a moose runs across the lanes in front of you. (That only happened once but I keep hoping for a repeat—of course, far enough in front to not endanger bumper or moose.