Choose Strong
For Tim.
I read this post and followed up with the books
"The Mushroom Hunters" and "Fat of the Land,"
both from the author Langdon Cook.
I first read about hunting and foraging three years
ago in "The Omnivore's Dilemma" by Michael Pollan.
The proses there felt smooth and disarmingly easy,
and I could just relax and enjoy the good stories.
Cook's books, however, sent me to dictionaries. It
might be a masochistic bent, but they met one of my
standards for a good read: it has to make me work,
preferably willingly.
I met such short words as ken (as in "beyond my
ken"), grub, hamlet, etc., and longer ones such as
persnickety and bodhisattva. Some I simply could
not find in my conventional dictionaries and had
to turn to the Web. For example, "gastronaut"
looked like a clever combination of the prefix
gastro- and the suffix -naut and, indeed, according
to the Wiktionary, meant "A person with a keen
appreciation for food," to which I would add "and
adventurous." Hyperboles like "deathbed revelation"
made me laugh and so did the graphic "She smiled
the exasperating smile of the sensible."
I jotted down the interesting words and phrases in
the hope of retaining some. In a sense, I was acting
like a forager in front of nature's bounty. Just like a
mushroom hunter, I have found a secret patch
of well-arranged words and felt I had the exclusive
right and urgency to collect as much as I could. I felt
the same way picking carobs in my neighborhood.
Mostly, I enjoyed the books because they expanded
my knowledge of the geography, history, food, and
culture of the Pacific Northwest, much of which
felt actionable. Someday, I might visit such eateries
as the Sitka & Spruce at downtown Seattle or the
Spotty Pig in Manhattan, to see how worthy they
really are. I might take up the "gun" to hunt razor
clams or simply go into the woods with chanterelle
in mind. I could go wrestling with steelheads in an
Oregon stream or simply join the local anglers on
a public pier. I dreamt such dreams before and the
books, by detailing the author's experiences (including
cooking), brought them closer. The knowledge
between the covers was empowering.
