Mountains of Mushrooms!

  This whole summer has seen us in one of the worst droughts on record for the area. It was really strange because folks all around us were getting weekly rains. Here, within one square mile, nothing...nary a drop!  I gave up on the inground gardens, watered the potted plants and put out bins of water for my wild critter friends.  I could not water all of the trees so they soon lost their leaves in an effort to survive. The threat of wildfires kept me raking and mowing like a maniac!  Several mornings, the smell of thick smoke caused me to go into a frenzy of removing dead leaves!  Then, last week, we got rain!  Not much but enough to ease the mind.  For three days, a slow drizzle settled the dirt and the soul.  All in all, we only got a half inch over the course of three days but it was very appreciated.

  During those three drizzly days, the fungi world came alive. The poor things obviously have been sitting dormant for the duration of the drought and, suddenly, were able to burst forth in happiness!  Early one morning, I came across a huge mound of the prettiest, tan-colored mushrooms.  An old, rotted stump had played host to this colony!  As I mentioned, it was huge...a mountain of mushrooms, so it seemed.  The clump was about eighteen inches in height and about that in diameter!  I was enthralled by the find and wanted to find out more about these beauties!

  Pondering just how to go about identifying mushrooms, my thoughts turned to my oldest son.  Mark is up on all sorts of things and is quickly learning about fungi...a newfound interest.  So...I quickly sent him the photographs.  He suggested that these looked a lot like Ringless Honey Mushrooms.  He then asked, "Did you eat them?"  Yeah...sure...I eat all unidentified mushrooms.  NO!  I did not eat them because I had no idea if they were edible.  He then informed me not to eat them raw.  They had to be cooked.  I think I will leave that eating part to him but I was appreciative of the identification.  The name suits them well as they are definitely honey-colored!    Sad to say, a few days later, my mountain of mushrooms had dissolved into a gooey, gelatinous mess!  My pretty, pretty mushrooms were now a fly-covered gunk!  

Bayou Mud, Memories, And Giggles

   I often speak of our "Bayou Mud" and the quicksand-like sinking that comes with it.  Never...I repeat...NEVER drop anything into that mud that you ever wish to see again.  It ain't happenin', folks.  Once it is in there, it is there to stay.  Some 50 years ago, Pop slipped and accidently dropped a small outboard motor into the water about 3 ft from shore.  Down it went and, even though, he tried, he never found that motor again. It is probably "perfectly preserved" somewhere down deep in that mud like an ancient artifact.  Also, never think you are going to "slip" over the side of the pier/boat or whatever and walk to retrieve something.  You...you will sink just as rapidly.  Just like that...you will become so mired in the mud that you may become "perfectly preserved" like one of those bog mummies that I read about in history books only you would be a bayou mummy.

  I was thinking about the squishy mud when a memory slipped into my head.  This had been stored there for some time now just waiting for the opportunity to pop back up and bring a giggle.  When my oldest son headed off to college and had been there some time, I asked if he missed anything from back home.  I was thinking he may mention some item and I could secretly ship it to him as a surprise.  Well, that surprise was on me, I guess.  He told me that he missed the smell of the mud during low tide.  Huh?  Alrighty, then.  I never thought anyone would miss that and there went my idea of a surprise package.  I was not about to go scoop up a bottle of mud and ship it to college.  Nope...ain't happenin'!  I am not shipping mud anywhere!  It was sort of nice to hear that he did miss something from the Bayou and home, however.  Mud?  What was wrong with missing me? With all of his world travels now, I wonder if he still misses it?

  I guess if anyone was around at sunrise this morning and heard me giggling while on the pier, they most likely thought I was slap nuts.  Maybe I am...but it is nice to think back on fun memories instead of dwelling on the current state of affairs in this old world.  

Box of Nostalgia

   The past month...yes, MONTH...has seen me clearing out, repainting and totally cleaning the upstairs guest bedroom.  It took a month.  It will take another month to get rid of the stuff that I hauled downstairs.  It is amazing that the Little Bayou House has not collapsed from the sheer weight of stuff that has been piled in it.  To be fair, a lot of the clutter upstairs had to be stored there when termites decided to eat the downstairs.  When there is major construction going on, you really do not want to have furniture and knickknacks in the way.  So, I hauled it all upstairs.  This month, I hauled it all back downstairs.  Some has been discarded but it really is important to have chairs at the dining table.  Putting pictures back on the walls was a nice touch, too.  Yep, all of that was upstairs.  All of that and a whole slew of items left behind by my kids when they moved on with their lives.

  I hit a bit of nostalgia with my sorting.  In a box of things that my oldest son had in his room as a kid, I found a bunch of wall plaques.   These things were garage sale finds, flea market purchases or gifts to him when he decided to decorate his room HIS way.  I was all for it.  Nowadays, kids would never be happy doing what he did.  The search for treasures was a huge part of his fun when he was choosing the perfect items.  In this day and age, kids do not want "old things".  It all has to be new and be exactly what everybody else has.  Not my kids.  They loved having the freedom to express themselves.  He did exactly that.  So did the other two.  

  Now, those "treasures" are left for me to dispose, keep or rehome.  As I am going through the boxes, I often wonder if I should have kept the kids' rooms strictly "neat as a pin" instead of letting them have the freedom to decorate as they pleased.  I figure it had a lot to do with letting them develop their own personalities.  I can say that each of them turned out to be pretty great adults.  Maybe that says something...or maybe that says it all.