It is the first day outside for the Green City Market 2009.
This early in the growing year, everything at the market really is green: spinach, green garlic, sprouts, ferns, sorrel, asparagus. This transfers into the excitement of everyone there. Met with smiles, I quickly and frivolously collected the last of what little morels were left, and I heard from my shoulder: “God will strike you down if you buy the last of them.” Springtime might be the only greedy time at the market as customers rush to get a taste of such wild delicacies. I offered her half of the lot, but she just swooned of the bags she use to collect as a girl. I walked away with the morsels bouncing in a little bag and my soft grin.
Even with millennia of agricultural tradition and modern technology, we still have to let the morels, the ramps, the ferns run wild. Let them find the perfect fallen tree to grow from in the soggy spring sun. There are still secrets of the landscape and we can praise the alchemist foragers, rush to their bounty, and prod them for their tricks.
