October Foray
Originally published on Substack in Oct ‘23
Contemplating mortality in the company of decomposers
Today’s autumn has settled like a heavy fog over the hills. It’s a blue October day and a welcome change from the recent warm weather. I’ve just returned from a morning foray with a few friends. I always accept a request for a nature walk in October, with so much to see.
Along our path we stumbled upon many fungi but the most attractive of today’s foray was Hericium americanum; common name: “bear’s tooth”. It resembles a frozen waterfall emerging off the side of a rotten log. Get close up to Hericium americanum and you’ll see how alien they are, a small city of stalagmites, long white spines gently winding over one another. If you sit for a while you’ll see all of the creatures that stop to visit this marvel, the flies, slugs, and chipmunks. While edible, we are not foraging today, and we leave this one for the forest dwellers to enjoy.
Hericium americium (bear’s tooth fungus) photo by Katie Crawford
On nature walks I am often asked how I became interested in fungi. The truth is, I found myself getting out into nature to escape the stress of a corporate job. Observing nature leads to observing fungi. I didn’t know their names, so I learned them, and then I came to know them, and loved them and did not turn away. If this question of my fungal origin is asked during the fall, I’ll also weave in a seasonally appropriate conversation about death and decomposition.
I think about my own death regularly. It was a thought that used to send my body into a seizing panic, sweating palms, heart beating in my ears. Our greatest unhappiness is brought on by our inability to let go of whatever it is we are gripping too tightly. Autumn teaches us that all the energy that is borrowed, all the growth must be returned, that we are connected to a system greater than ourselves. I grew tired of holding on to fear of something I could not control, so I loosened my grip. I look at death from a different angle, that death is only change, and change like water, there is no life without it.
In fall, the mushrooms can be seen in force. This is their premier season. It’s a delight to revel in all their colors, shapes and odors, to trip over your friends trying to get a better look at the slug trails glittering in the sun spots. It becomes an exercise in slowing down enough to crouch amidst the plants and leaf litter, viewing the universes that swirl and transform beneath our notice. The complexity of everything that surrounds and supports us opens a window to experience awe of our own existence, in our own backyards.
When I die, my body will be decomposed by fungi, bacteria, insects. They will do their life’s work, of releasing every part of me that has been borrowed from this earth, back out to be redistributed up through the many channels of the web of life. Instead of fearing my own death, I think about how I will give back to this world that has nourished me. One day I will be able to support all different types of life forms. I’m reminded of all the many ways that I am grateful, grateful for a world that has created the conditions to support all of the people and places I love, and have yet to love.
Once on another fall day like today, in a rambling conversation with my friend Maya, we spoke of death. I joked at how cool it would be to be a mushroom, and she replied, “We’ll all be mushrooms someday.”
That doesn’t seem so bad.
