Seaweed

On one of the myriad bays along the Maine coast. Keep the holocaust at bay I said to Dave because you’ll spend all day gathering 2,000 calories and still be miserable hungry. An undiminished population of humans is risible. Black spruce and balsam fir, you can eat the inner bark in a starvation emergency. There’s plenty of Cornus—bunchberry— each orange pith around the stone worth maybe a quarter calorie. Lots of sarsparilla but the fruits not out yet and to date I have not savored one. Let’s see—dandelion of course and huckleberry but the most important source of sustenance would be seaweed. Learn your mushrooms! for the protein. Accept the situation come the apocalypse. I struggle against my insignificance but it would be better to struggle against my ignorance. Less effortlessness, more fishermanliness. That’s the lesson of this Maine vacation there’s a lot you can eat when in need— the hips of roses and the pips of grasses. And an endless supply of seaweed— bladderwrack, dulse, kelp and thin green lettuce.