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A Damn Idiot
- University of Minnesota Press
- Chapter
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A Damn Idiot Heartleaf arnica spreads from extensive underground roots, does not crowd itself. . . . LEE STRICKLER It was a wet summer in Idaho's Nez Perce National Forest, and the mountains were ripe with wildflowers. In a meadow above Fish Creek I was cheered by flecks and clusters of color—red, yellow, blue, violet, orange—against a lush backdrop of multiple shades of green encompassed by a cloudspeckled sky. There was a bee hovering on nearly every blossom, and they generated a pervasive hum that seemed a vibration of the air itself. Though I had recently cataloged fifty-three species of wildflowers on our forty acres of woods back in Minnesota 33 (and expected to find many more), the Nez was virgin territory , and I eagerly thumbed through my newly purchased field guide to the northern Rocky Mountain states. In a few minutes I could identify golden pea, rose pussytoes, queen's cup, small-floweredpenstemon, black-headedconeflowers, and a half-dozen others. I was delighted, thoroughly engaged by these fresh wonders, and also glad to find some of the same flowers that lived in the forests of home—yarrow, wild rose, dandelion, strawberry, cinquefoil. I was clambering upslope toward yet another clump of enticing strangers when I found half the jaw of along-dead elk. I automatically picked it up, as surely as I would have at age seven; I've always been fascinated by bones and skeletons discovered in the woods. Most of the teeth were gone, and I hastily replaced the jaw when I realized it was sheltering a colony of red ants. Twenty feet farther on I spotted the opposite half of the jaw,and another time I might have joined the two and studied them against the sky. But these decaying bones shattered my mood. The image of death, however natural and appropriate in that sylvan meadow, forcefully reminded me of the day's events. Why was I hunting wildflowers, rambling that ridgeline like a carefree child? Why hadn't I just retreated to my rented trailer and slunk into bed? Only a short time earlier my impulse had been to hurry there and draw the covers over my face. My first day off since arriving in Grangeville, Idaho, for a seasonal Forest Service firefighting job had begun well. I enjoyed a brisk workout at the base; the weather was gorgeous, and on the spur of the moment over morning coffee I decided to transfer my wildflowerhobby to the Nez Perce forest . I needed a field guide, and I figured the quaint little bookstore downtown was bound to stock one. But as I walked the mile or so through town, I encountered three disturbing scenes in a matter of minutes. First was the nursing home yard. An old man was sunk in a lawn chair, his spine crooked with age. He was bent over 34 The Snow Lotus [18.206.160.129] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 15:42 GMT) nearly double, and the only thing he could see was his lap. His face was pinched and sallow, pale as a cadaver, and I easily imagined him in a casket. He had a pair of visitors—I guessed an adult daughter and a grandson—and I heard him mumbling, speaking at his thighs. I had no proof this man was miserable, but the obvious ravages of life and time suddenly struck me as an immutable vision of the future. It was possible, perhaps probable, that his decrepitude would be mine. At age forty-two I was already feeling stabs of arthritis , deteriorating discs, a damaged knee. I looked away. Three blocks farther on I saw a middle-aged woman leaning on a planter at a street corner. There was a worn knapsack slouched at her feet, and she clutched a sign madeof dirty cardboard. She held it up for passersby to read: "Hungry . Out of money, out of gas. Please help." I debated as I approached. I wasn't exactly flush with cash myself. Why else would I be working for $8.79 per hour 1,400 miles from home? And maybe this woman was just a panhandler and not truly gripped by emergency. But she appeared genuine, and I was on an errand to spend several dollars on a wildflower field guide—a frivolous purchase in light of her apparent need. I quickly rifled through the bills in my wallet as I walked, judged the distance to my first payday, and pulled out a fiver...