Lamont's new old Volvo station wagon.

Lamont came over Sunday to take me to the grocery store and to show the new old Volvo station wagon to me. He told me he parked here in particular because he knew I would want to take a few pictures of the car, so he figured the fall foliage should be in the photos, too.


The car came with that Thule pod and the rack! Wow! How cool! Well, he said that maybe all of the decals made him look more like a soccer mom than ever. Somehow I don't think anyone's going to mistake my son for that, just his car. Ha, ha.


One last photo to share with you. It better shows the actual color of the car. He's now the third owner of this vehicle, which I think is super.

Now for the story of why Lamont has a new old Volvo station wagon. (After the story, see photos of the old old Volvo station wagon.)

For the past few years, Lamont has enjoyed driving a 1989 Volvo station wagon, when he didn't walk to wherever he was going. He bought it from Kailey, Leland's girlfriend. The Saturday night before Halloween, three weeks ago today, he drove along a shadowy, curved road on the way home from a friend's apartment--I think it is a two-lane road, too. In front of him, a Ford Econoline van stopped all of a sudden. He stopped. It started again. He started again, wondering what was going on. The van stopped again; he stopped again. Just as he was about to blow his horn, the van's driver put it into reverse and rammed the front end of his Volvo. Alarmed, he locked the doors and rolled up his windows. Who would get out of the van? Turned out it was a woman who admitted that she was trying to find somewhere and thought she'd driven past it, so she backed up! Ruined his car is what she did. Totaled his car is what she did, $3000 to fix it, which of course didn't make any sense due to its age. She does not want to ever meet me.

That Volvo station wagon had been the car that Lamont drove to take Mama to all sorts of doctor and physical therapy appointments. It was the vehicle we picked up and dropped off my brother at the airport when he came to town to help move me to my new place after she had died, early January this year. In November, 2008, it was the car that took Lamont, Leland, and me to the woods, mushrooming. Earlier that same month it had taken Lamont, Mama, our friend Lucy (visiting from Mississippi), and me on a great tour of the Columbia River Gorge and over to Hood River, Oregon, then south around Mt. Hood and back to Portland. And since then he's driven it out of town several times camping and/or bouldering, having fun with his brother and/or friends. For his 36th birthday I had given Lamont a repair of the passenger window motor and a general tune-up of that car. All of that for naught now--blast that irresponsible woman. Good memories remain, however, and serve to dim the aggravation.

Also dimming the aggravation. The woman's insurance put him in a rental car and paid him $75 less than he needed to get the new old Volvo station wagon. Serendipitously a woman where Lamont works had the car for sale. By the end of the second week of dealing with an insurance company in a different time zone while working 40-hour weeks, Lamont got that money from Farmers and sold his old car to this wonderful repair place just east of where I live, Atomic Auto, for a fair price. He ended up with the new old Volvo station wagon and $25.

The new old Volvo station wagon checked out fine with the Atomic Auto guys (they were the ones who fixed that window, etc.), has half the mileage on it that the old old Volvo station wagon had on it. For all of us, this entire event turned out so much better than we could have ever hoped. Prayers answered.

Now for some photos of the old old Volvo station wagon and our mushrooming trip. If they make you hungry for all of the trip which was quite a lot of fun and very successful, the posts are on November 26, 2008; November 28, 2008; and November 30, 2008. You won't believe the forest and the mushrooms and the ferns and the trees and the guys.


Lamont and Leland arrive at our old apartment--I was waiting out front, excited about our pending adventure.


Lamont and Leland in the old old Volvo station wagon, as we pulled away from the curb.


Lamont and Leland getting ready to hunt chanterelles.


Just before we started the hunt, the guys posed for me.


Once we got back to the old old Volvo station wagon, hours later, the guys posed for me again. Look at our mushrooms!


We got wet, but who cares? I didn't fall down once, thanks to my wonderful sons. And I found the very first golden mushroom, too!

Thankful for mushrooming, Part III

To get this photo, I held one of the largest mushrooms we found in my left hand and the camera in my right.

Lamont got close to the ground among the ferns and evergreens.

Sweet smile to me, his mom.

If you look closely, you can see Lamont on the left and Leland on the right, diligently searching and harvesting chanterelles among the ferns.

Lamont's find.

Leland's find.

Wow--what a mushroom!

See its size in relation to Leland!

And here it is in my basket.

At times like this, the woods seemed like a maze, but I had not a single worry, trusting my sons as I did to get me, themselves and the mushrooms back to the car.

Look at this terrain behind the guys and their baskets. Fallen trees of all sizes cover the ground.

Lamont heads up and over a fallen tree.

The guys stopped for a moment to stand beside this huge stump! In the background, see the trees lying across the clearing? In a few moments after I took this photo, I decided to take a seat and rest there while the guys went across a little creek and into a darker part of the woods. They said they'd come back in a little while and get me.

Lamont took a few steps and found a mushroom.

Here he is with it. You can see my downed-tree-resting-spot even better in this photo.

I placed my basket on the tree trunk beside me and got this photo.

Lamont came back and got me. When I looked back at one point at what he'd helped me climb and clamber over, I couldn't believe it. I don't think this photo does it justice, but it's all I could get. Little space existed between trunks and limbs, all with moss everywhere. I said, "Hey, guys, I feel like I've landed in Ewok land." They agreed, and Leland said, "That's Endor, Mom." "Right, I remember now. Endor," I said.

Lamont has both of our baskets--I'd need both hands free to help myself over the terrain. And when I saw this part of it, I thought, "Ah, less obstacles!"

Here's a lavender-purple mushroom that we left right where it grew.

And a brown one, too.

And these little ones, growing so sure of themselves.

How about this little crowd of mushrooms?

A drop of gold, found by Leland. He waited for me to get there so that I could take photos.

Harvesting it from the earth, carefully.


Not long afterward, Leland disappeared behind some low branches, only to find a great chanterelle. "You ought to see this one," he cried. "It's huge!" "Hold it up above the limbs," I said. And he did.

Here it is from the stem side.

Lamont took this photo for me, to show you those trees in the background. I managed with his help to get up and on and over them. Only casualty--my pants leg came out of my boots, but I didn't even notice that until I saw the photo.


Sorry, y'all, but I took so many pictures that I can't finish yet! Mama said, "Don't put so many pictures on there." I replied, "Mama, this is for me, too, because some day when I can't remember some of this, all I'll have to do it look at the blog." "Oh," she said, and she then remembered what she'd understood after reading through the printed sheets from Lucy's visit. I'm mailing them to my Aunt Baker in Puckett, Mississippi, who doesn't have a computer. Mama had looked up from the kitchen table and announced, "I know what your blog is. It's a journal." She's so right. And I thank you for indulging me!

Thankful for mushrooming, Part I

I set my alarm, got up real early, ate my oatmeal and looked out the windows for rain. I even watched the early Saturday morning weather on KGW, Channel 8, the NBC affiliate. The more I looked and watched and pondered, the better I felt our chances were of not getting drenched like the forecast on Monday night had made it sound.

Nevertheless, I decided to err on the side of preparation, as in that saying, Success is 90% preparation and 10% perspiration. At least I think that's a saying? Y'all help me out if I'm way off base, please. And I decided to document my preparation.

First, here's a close-up of my positive attitude, something I strive to take with me everywhere, every day.

In this photo you see my Los Lonely Boys hat, the short-sleeved black Dale Earnhardt memorial T-shirt, my Nikon D50, plus my pine green Helly Hansen raincoat underneath my navy blue Marmot raincoat. I'm sitting on the side of our bathtub; we're lucky to have a full-length mirror on the door, on the side that faces the dressing room attached to the bathroom.

I'm so glad I could show you the black rubber boots! Those gray pants, tucked into my boots, are some old knit ones that I wouldn't be concerned with in the brambles Lamont had mentioned to me. Underneath them I'm wearing a pair of lightweight cotton knit full-length pants. My extra clothes are in that white plastic bag. My extra camera battery, wallet and coin purse rested in one pocket, my cell phone, keys, and bus pass in the other--I hardly ever leave home without my bus pass, more of that 90% preparation.

About 45 minutes after I got all my layers on, the guys drove up in Lamont's car. Leland's riding shotgun. And I just noticed something as I looked at this photo in its largest size at Flickr--he's seen me waiting on the steps and has a great big ol' grin on his face! By the time I walked down the steps, he'd moved from the front seat into the back, leaving the front seat for me. I had my motion-sickness-bracelets on already--they'd help me if we ended up anywhere steep or high or cliff-edge-like.

Lamont gave me a grin, too, as I struggled with my seat belt, just like Mama and Lucy had done on the Monday he'd driven us through the Columbia Gorge. "It begins," he said with mock solemnity before breaking out in this grin that I captured with my camera.

Then I held the camera up to my shoulder, pointed it at Leland and snapped.

As we headed out of the city, we met a MAX as we approached the Vista Bridge.

I couldn't get my camera on and focused quick enough to get any of the gliders, but I did get the sign and the tip of a wing, on the right side of the photo. For reasons I cannot explain nor do I understand, the thought of riding in a glider appeals to me. And Lamont said the same thing, almost in the same words, as we went by on the highway. Not too long after taking this photo, I asked, "Am I going to get to go to the bathroom one more time before we go into the woods?" Thank goodness, the answer was yes. We stopped at a Dairy Queen where Leland grabbed some breakfast--he's notorious for not eating breakfast, so I was thrilled to see this development.

We rolled off the highway onto this wooded dirt road. As we drove along for a few minutes, going around a curved incline, I looked around and commented, "This isn't flat, Lamont." His reply, "I never said it was, Mom." He's right. I'd been fooled by some documentary about hunting mushrooms in Europe into thinking we'd be in a wooded area which gently sloped from point to point.

The guys changed shoes, part of their preparation.


Our three mushrooming baskets, all purchased at the local Goodwill--we support Goodwill and its service to our community.

Leland's putting on his gaiters which ought to keep his lower legs somewhat dry as well as protect them from brambles and briars.

Lamont's explaining where and how wet he's been at the end of other mushroom hunts because he didn't take his gaiters.

While the guys finished getting ready, I noticed this tree trunk. It's like an abandoned old building that's been remodeled, don't you think? I mean, look at all of the little trees growing out of it!

His entire life, Leland hasn't been able to resist a puddle--he stomped through three in no time!

Just before we set out, the guys posed for me, holding their empty baskets. I stood there, looking at them through the camera, thinking, "I'm the luckiest woman in the world" and "Their Daddy would be so proud!"

We began our search by turning left at the end of the long on the left.

As we walked along, Lamont began to explain to the two of us where to look for the chanterelles, near tree trunks, fallen logs, among knee-high-evergreen-thickets and huge, robust ferns. I walked along, watching first the ground where we walked, then the steep earthen bank we walked beside, on the right. In a split second, I saw a flash of gold and interrupted my darlin' firstborn son, pointing: "Is that one right there?" He looked where I pointed and said, "It sure is!" Chuckling in awed disbelief, Lamont sort of crowed, "Mom found the first one! Nobody's gonna believe this! Mom found the first one." What a moment! What a memory!

See the beauty hiding in the ferns? Being only around 5'4" I couldn't hold the camera high enough to get a better shot, but I sort of like how this looks, cropped to find the mushroom in the fronds, just about dead center in the photo.

Leland scurried up the bank, quickly joined by his brother. The chanterelle is straight down from Leland's right elbow in this shot.

The two of them inspected the mushroom, Lamont pointing out how to cut it from the earth, at the stem, leaving its roots in place. Leland's reaching for his knife.

Leland cut his first chanterelle under the watchful eyes of his older brother. Once again, what a moment, what a memory, for all three of us.

Lamont's grin is in response to my, "Can I make it up there?" The both answered, "Yes," with no hesitation. And between the three of us, we got me atop that bank and our trek in the real woods began.

Before I stop for this post, the initial chanterelles of many, many more to come.

More tomorrow--I'm watching the Barbara Walters' interview of the Obamas.