Consolation Jellies on a Snow Earthstar Hike

I have hardly been out on our mountain since the hurricane.

The trails are gone in many places, uprooted trees are blocking paths, storm debris, mud, and heaved-up and tumbled stones have dramatically changed our ways and wanderings.

Nonetheless, I wanted to see if I could find earthstars, so Lance and I whistled up the cats (Rocky declined to come) and set out to see if we could find some. They are easiest to find in early winter, after a snowmelt or good rain.

We had a bit of ice and snow still dotting the woods, but we didn’t make it far before finding our trail up the East ridge blocked by an uprooted tree. We were expecting this, so we climbed over and kept looking for our old path.

We did find some parts of the trail, but after poking through long stretches of wet clumps of leaves, we gave up on earthstars.

It’s hard not to feel dispirited.

We still see and deal with storm damage every day. It’s incredibly difficult to get workers out here; we’ve been trying for months to get estimates on our trees that need to come down and the repairs to our driveway and we are still coming up empty. People agree to come, then never show, despite repeated texts and calls.

We’ve been unable to get a FEMA person out to review our claims, despite multiple calls and a trip into town to talk to representatives in person. We’ve heard we may get $200 toward our ($1200) chainsaw purchase, but we doubt we’ll get even that.

Most local roads have been patched, but it will still be a long time before they are repaired. Highway 421, our main route to groceries and a health clinic in Mountain City, Tennessee, finally re-opened a few days before Christmas, but many other roads are still heavily damaged and/or closed. Our son’s workplace in Mountain City, Parkdale Mills, finally announced their decision to close the badly flooded factory, and laid off all the workers. Many businesses in Ashe, Watauga, and surrounding NC counties are still shuttered, operating out of mobile units, or open on a radically abbreviated schedule.

It’s been three difficult post-hurricane months.

Lance hiked down ahead of me, and I lingered a while, gently uncovering several small colonies of sharp-lobed hepatica leaves. They’ll have sturdy white blooms this March, but for now, only the green- and brown-speckled leaves are showing in the woods.

The cats, happy to be on a hike after so long, played in the leaves. I was just about to head back when Lance called out from below me on the mountain.

“Jellies!” he said. “Yellow and orange ones.”

I felt instantly better. Jellies are almost as good as earthstars, and I was willing to refocus on just about anything colorful on this muddy greyday hike.

I carefully made my way down to see.

Sure enough, two pretty clumps of jelly fungus, still fat with snowmelt, were clinging happily to some rotting sticks. Also a bit of woodland stonecrop amid the lichens and moss.

It’s hard not to smile at something so bright and cheerful, shining in the woods, after the storm, as the year ends.