Boomer Day Forecast

About twenty residents met at Sandy Wayside Park this past Saturday to do some volunteer work on the trails and, by chance, get a glimpse of Barlow or Belle Boomer.  Boomer Day, being February 2nd, is half way between the winter solstice and the spring equinox.  This "cross quarter" time is observed in pagan as well as religious ceremonies.   For us, and especially this year, after a rather long cool, snowy spell since Christmas, Boomer Day turned out to be beautiful, sunny and mild.  And did indeed remind us that spring it definitely coming.

So this band of local volunteers enjoyed the quiet, peaceful visit into mountain beaver territory.  One person briefly saw one of our boomers quickly hide under the dense canopy.  Now did the Boomer see its shadow?   We can argue whether or not there was a Boomer shadow to see, as under the dense canopy it is all shadow.  Now if we could grab the Boomer and carry it out to the parking lot, then it would see its shadow because it was a lovely sunny day.  This philosophical discussion needs to be clarified much as the humans have decided in the most famous of all groundhog publicity shows.  In this case we would argue that yes the Boomer would have seen its shadow if it was out and away from his/her natural habitat.

And what difference does it make? In some climates there can be more distinct weather changes of continuing cold or nice warm up associated with spring.  Here on the western slope of Mt. Hood and the Cascade Mountain Range, we live in a rain forest with 100" or more of rain.  More than twice the rainfall of Portland which is only an hour drive downhill into congestion.  So these months (February, March, April, and May) are significant for their rainfall.  The rain clouds come and stick around the tall trees and moss on our foothills like velcro.  So our paradigm is not six more weeks of winter vs. the appearance of an early spring.  Our paradigm is more like six or twelve more weeks of rain.

So in the tradition of previous (in all time) of hedgehog and groundhog sightings, our Boomer "saw" its shadow and twelve more weeks of rain (our modification) is the Boomers forecast.  The sighting was attested to by a local group of anonymous (but not hermit) neighbors who enjoy the wilderness on both sunny and rainy days.

Confessions of a wild love affair

We are pleased as peach to share with you a wonderful piece written by our neighbor.  We hope you enjoy this as much as we do.  Thanks Paul for letting us post this.

Confessions of a wild love affair

Doting on Venus slippers

and rough-skinned newts


By Paul Keller

           Photo By Paul Keller

I treasure every season here.

From the welcome return of those long summer bare-toe days; to that tart-in-your-mouth, leaf-turning cool night first breath of fall; to winter’s revisit of wet and gray, good-for-hibernating short days—when the planet’s polar air mass shoves pell-mell down atop us once again with her ornery promises of ice and snow.

While I can find kinship with all these diverse phases of our calendar year here, my first and foremost true love will never change: the vernal equinox.

Spring.

For the past 20 years, I have lived literally tucked away in the woods at the foot of the same towering, tree-thick east-west bearing mountain ridge. With no roads, no trails, no houses—and absolutely no people—this wild ridgeline tumbles down through every season in so many different generations of green.

Like I do at this time every year, each morning the past few days, I walk out my door into this ancient silence of cedar, hemlock and fir. I follow the twist of centuries-old deer trails back up into the places I know—from past explorations—where, just below my boots, trillium seeds now push new life up through the weight of the earth.

Even as I write this—after yet another long winter—they are remembering their way, once again, up toward the pull of February sun. With enviable grit and faith, they are renewing the beginning of this miracle we call spring.

Last year, on March 11, the first trillium blossom appeared.

To gently press my fingertip to the skin of this flower’s first glacial-white petals, restores my faith in the world.

Four days after I find that first trillium, I follow another route farther up the hill through the stubborn arms of shoulder-high mountain mahogany (used for arrow shafts by our area’s original residents) to greet—there beside the same congregations of licorice and lady fern—the season’s first faces of tiny yellow wood violets.

Now, in the next few weeks, I will once again salute and embrace the return of so many signs of spring—from vanilla leaf to the rare surprise of Venus slipper. And I will welcome back more than this wonderful celebration of wildflowers.

On March 10 last year, I watch a rough-skinned newt emerge for his mating season, slowly pulling his bright orange belly across the shadows of oxalis and salal. (Exactly where, five winters ago, I snowshoed onto the surprise of black-red snow to find a freshly killed adult deer at my feet. The hunter was four-legged. Still warm, the big doe was surrounded by explosions of huge cougar tracks.)

On March 16 last year, I watch a flame-crested pileated woodpecker, a juvenile, careen through dappled sunlight near that first Cascades frog-loving pond at the ridge’s top. Where I have also met the shy and mysterious rubber boa snake. (And where the male elk sometimes secretly return in the fall.)

On March 28, a golden eagle circles the sky over the rock field that sweeps down the hill just above my house. I will see and hear him throughout the summer, weaving the blue air or landing in the old wildfire-scarred snags high above this broad expanse of moss-covered rock. (Down below, I know a flat piece of basalt that you can lift to sometimes see a black scorpion scuttle back down its secret hole.)

Of course, that next day last spring, I also come home with the year’s first blood-sucking deer tick happily lodged in my body. Another apropos reminder that Ma Nature—she who creates not only wildflowers but devil’s club and stinging nettle—is no one-dimensional Pollyanna.

Every day I marvel at what might be moving down just beyond my porch light again tonight. Wolverine? Black bear? Bobcat? Cougar? I have had the honor to hold all four in my eyes here before.

So, how do I explain all this wonderment to the befuddled people who continue to ask: “You still live up on Mount Hood?”

It seems “success” in our jet-propelled, upwardly mobile peripatetic world is measured by how many times we relocate to ostensibly snare that bigger title.

In the Navajo language there is no word for “moving houses.”

I share this indigenous nation’s historical perspective. Of the two views of earth: as commodity/real estate or ancestor, I am unquestionably endeared to the latter.

For I have surely found my place right here where—after six long months—my own ancestors arrived in their ox-pulled wagons inside that beginning of fall 150 years ago.

I have no doubt that another six months later, they too marveled at their year’s first trillium. They knew, as I do, that they had finally found home.

Writer Paul Keller lives in the Upper Sandy River Watershed on the western slopes of Mount Hood.

monet in the woods

At this time of the year, as the alder and vine maple leafs are not yet full and show the "spring green" colors, a slow walk takes it all in.  I titled this short piece "monet in the woods" and it is.  Here are two pictures of what I mean.

Crutcher's Bench and the Smithsonian Museums

Snow falling on cedars… hemlock and doug firs, too. It snowed all over Crutcher’s Bench yesterday on the next to last day of April. I was not there. Everyone must have thought I was at Buckingham Palace attending the royal wedding. But no, I had to eschew that invitation because of a more pressing engagement: the ADAPT demonstrations in our nation’s capitol calling for home and community based services for people with disabilities as opposed to forcing folks to live in nursing homes and other institutions.

The weather and flora and fauna are gorgeous in Washington: 70 degrees, sunny, a light wind. Apple, pear, peach, varied colored dogwood trees, and azalea all with bursting blooms. Here, they squeeze in the flora and fauna between buildings and concrete.

I’m enjoying this time in the city where every convenience is at one’s fingertips. Groceries, drug stores, and yummy restaurants are within walking distance. And culture? The Capitol Mall with Smithsonian museums lining either side is just 2 blocks away.

I get why people live in great cities with all that we think we need just minutes away. Where I live, it is a 30-minute drive to a drugstore. The nearest art museum is over an hour’s drive and pales when compared to the National Gallery or the Met.

Still, I wouldn’t trade life on Crutcher’s Bench for a return to my old Georgetown condo. Something comes from living with trees, rocks, and rivers that is lost with urban dwelling.

A few short steps out my back door and I am among giants. Tall trees, boulders, moss, owls, and other creatures share this land. It is a path that leads not only to forest but unswervingly to the core of me. Oh this land that holds me, cries me, smiles, shakes, and dances me clear to the very ground of being.

This week will be full of having conveniences at one’s fingertips and visiting the National Gallery and National Museum of the American Indian. It’s a time to move along streets packed with people and inhale the plethora of spring blossoms.

Then, with profound joy, I’ll return to forest and family…home to Crutcher’s Bench where shopping is at a distance but soul and center are accessible.

A Carpet of Trilliums

It was a spectacular 60-degree day on Crutcher’s Bench on March 29. Walking a path near the rushing creek, I glimpsed the season’s first Trillium. Several more of those delicious spring heralds appeared. In fact, I cannot remember a year when the Trillium flower has appeared in such abundance on Crutcher’s Bench.

Two days later the weather turned. There were days of wild wind, snow and hail. Warmed by a crackling wood fire, I thought of those trilliums and wondered whether the delicate blooms would be killed off or survive freezing temperatures and extreme weather.

Spring weather returned and there they were, those rugged flowers…a little bent and battered in places but still lovely. I was struck by the metaphor. Those Trilliums are rather like us. We humans open strong and willing, and survive all manner of life’s batterings. A flawed lot, most of us manage a core of integrity, compassion, and humor.

Here on the mountain, our modes of survival and communication are sometimes stellar…as in responding to the recent flood, which brought out the best in most of us. Sometimes too, those all too human flaws surface.

Drama, gossip, jumping to conclusions without factual inquiry are human flaws that sometimes batter our rural community like hail on Trilliums. After our high water event, when some Lolo Pass dwellers were stranded without phone communication, some folks were in high dudgeon about lack of cell coverage. The outcry for cell towers was ubiquitous and leveled with criticism of those who had successfully defeated placing a cell tower on Benchwood Lane.

The fact that the Benchwood Lane location would NOT have brought cell phone coverage to Lolo Pass residents was seemingly ignored, as was any inquiry into whether a tower was planned in a location that would actually serve our community. After all, why would one resort to ferreting out actual facts when drama and gossip are entertaining?

We all fall prey to expressing our flawed parts from time to time even when those flaws batter others. Spring, Trilliums, and shining though life’s storms remind me to trade drama and gossip for integrity and compassion.