Up behind the Big House on my aunt and uncle’s Montana ranch wound a dirt road leading deep into the hills. One morning I got up extra early, grabbed some food and my wild edible plant book, and started off.
This day I was determined to go farther than I had before; past the slope with the scree that was fun to slide down, past the cold spring surrounded by yellow Monkey flower and even past the hill tops covered with the sage I collected to make hair shine. The sun rose hot and the cool of the morning was soon gone as I followed the winding road past the familiar places. Towards early afternoon I reached new territory and I eagerly pushed on to see what was going to be around the next bend.
By mid-afternoon my steps were slowing and as the road led down between two hills it grew marshy and the air smelled of stagnation. I brushed away black flies as they buzzed around my sweat soaked face and I looked at a forest of dead trees mixed with leaning live ones; their branches so thick they blocked the light. I heard a crash to the left and jumped when a deer leapt a small meandering stream and disappeared into the shadows. As my eyes followed the path of the deer I saw the remains of an old log cabin poking up through the underbrush.
I walked over and found pieces of a wagon wheel stuck in the mire next to the cabin. Up a few feet on drier, sunnier ground were the remains of the garden plot with apple trees and rhubarb plants still growing. The sadness of the place was a stark contrast with the hope needed to plant these slow growing crops.
I now understand planting is truly an act of faith, a belief that the seeds will grow and that someone will be there to harvest. Each spring as I get ready to take this leap I think back to the homestead and wonder who had lived there and when had that hope withered and died?
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