“What are those trees up there?” I point looking to Jackie for an answer.
“Juniper, they are juniper trees, a coniferous evergreen tree native to high mountain desert forests,” the botanist in the family explains.
We reach the shade of the juniper grove, finally getting out of the sun’s direct rays. Tired from the day’s events, I look for a place to sit and rest.
I pay no attention to Jackie as she inspects, shakes, and smells something in her hands.
“Look at these purple berries from these trees and the little beige and brown nuts I found on the ground. What are they?”
Jackie begins rolling the little round things in her hand. The purple berries from the tree are the size of green peas. She breaks one open and inside the berry is one of the beige and brown nuts that looks like a little acorn. The beige and brown nuts on the ground were once covered in a purple layer. But the coatings dry and fall off, leaving these little beige and brown nuts.
Jackie displays a handful of the nuts and giggles, “Dad look, I found these under the juniper trees over there, they have holes in one end.”
Standing shoulder-to-shoulder, each of us takes a nut from Jackie’s hand. A thorough inspection concludes that every one of the nuts is about the size of a pencil eraser, about five centimeters. And each one has the shape of a very tiny acorn or even an apple. We stand inspecting the little nuts.
“Jackie, your hands are disgusting,” we laugh, as I look down at my own dirty hands. “Yuck!” They are covered in pine tar with dirt rubbed in. It’s stuck to my skin like glue. I try to peel it off by scraping it with a stick, then a rock. But it’s no use, it is dried on to my skin like cement.
Dad has sweat dripping from his head, and his shirt is wet around the collar and back. By now Jackie and I are both wishing we had worn shorts. But it was so cold this morning, and who would’ve thought it would be so hot this early in the day and it seems to be getting hotter by the minute.
I check the back of my hand. One of the beige and brown nuts is stuck between my fingers. Scrutinizing it, I inspect the incredibly perfect round hole in the middle of the top. The opening is deep and goes almost all the way through to the bottom. I hold it up to my eye to see if I can peer inside. The curious hole in the nut makes it look like a tiny apple that’s been cored. But it’s not cored all the way through. Nope, instead the one-centimeter wide tunnel ends just before the bottom.
Strangely centered, the hole seems to be in the exact same location on each and every nut. Perplexed, again I hold the juniper nut to my eye, looking into the dark hole searching for a revelation as to how and why it is there?
“How did the hole get there, Dad?” I question.
Dad shakes his head, “I don’t know, maybe that’s the way they are?”
Jackie declares, “I’ll show Chester, he will know. I’ll collect a bunch of them. I’m sure they are juniper nuts but how the heck did that hole get there?”
Dad and Jackie begin gathering nuts sitting under the juniper trees. It’s too hot to be moving around now. Minutes pass as I gaze into the blue sky and flora-covered marshes in the distance. We share several gulps of water from our canteen and chill on the hillside.
“I’m going to look for Neewa,” I announce, walking away from them. “Where are you guys going to be?”
Jackie answers, “We’ll be right here under these shady trees.”
“Stay here,” I say, “so I can find you when I get back.”
Jackie calls to me as I disappear from sight, “Ok we’ll be waiting.”
Walking up the ridge, I feel the freedom of being on my own. I’m alone in the wilderness with no one else around for miles.
I wonder what happened here long ago? Could I possibly be the first human to walk through this forest in thousands of years? Maybe I’m the only human who ever traveled here. Most likely Indians trekked through here in the last hundred years. I’m not the first, nor will I be the last.
Neanderthal man camped here a hundred thousand years ago. He probably lived in a nearby cave and painted the walls. It would be so cool to find one of those caves and discover paintings never seen before.
Approaching the top of the hill, I call out, “Neewa, Neewa come.”
Slipping back into my imagination, I wonder if buffalo once roamed here. They came to drink water and eat the grass at the marsh. The buffalo could’ve been hunted right here where I’m standing. Maybe this was once a buffalo jump, where buffalo were herded together and then stampeded off a cliff.
Ancient man and the Indians used to kill the buffalo that way. They chased the buffalo around and around in the canyon getting them all worked up. As the buffalo got more excited, they were stampeded towards a cliff and then over the edge. They died or were so badly injured it was easy for the hunters to finish them off.
In a history book I read, it said as many as a hundred buffalo would go off a cliff at once. Indians waited near the bottom and killed the ones that lived with spears and knives. It was gruesome.
Indians used all of the buffalo for one thing or another. It was their custom not to waste anything. Clothing was made from the skins. Some hides were made into blankets while others were used to cover tipis. The meat was dried into jerky so it would not spoil in the summer. And in the winter, the meat was kept frozen and away from animals underground.
Rambling along I daydream about the Piute, Washoe, and Gosh Ute Indians that once roamed this region. I wonder how they survived gathering roots and berries, and hunting mule deer, and other animals. It must have been a hard life.
These mule deer out West are similar to the whitetail deer back East. Except the mule deer is bigger, much bigger, and their antlers are twice the size. Other than that they have the same colored fur and just about everything else.
Quiet as a mouse, I approach the highest rocky peak of this mountain. Leaping from rock to rock, I skip along forgetting about where I am and what I’m doing here.
All of a sudden, I hear a thud and feel a vibration under my feet. It travels up through my knees and legs.
Startled, I look up at the blue western sky dotted with white fluffy clouds. The sun glares back into my eyes.