A brief escape from grading jail

"So what are you going to do to celebrate when you finish grading?" was my colleague's question, and my answer was "Go to the woods," but frankly, I'm not waiting for the grading to be done before I go to the woods. All week the weather has been keeping me indoors--all-day gray skies, high winds, drizzle, and rain--but this morning the forecast called for a few rain-free hours under a gloomy canopy of gray, so off I went to the woods despite the final papers still awaiting my attention.

Sometimes it takes a while for my mind to catch up with my body, so I was well into the damp woods at Lake Katharine, mulling over an issue concerning a student's late paper, when I suddenly looked up and felt the woods enveloping me, as if I'd suddenly walked into a whole new world. I put aside thoughts of grading and listened to a prairie warbler singing and some common yellowthroats and blue-gray gnatcatchers, and down by the swamp I heard that persistent Louisiana waterthrush.

I wasn't expecting to see much blooming since the magnolias aren't out yet and the early ephemerals are past their prime, but I surprised myself by finding some showy orchis blossoms just beginning to open in three different spots. I've been looking for them for weeks, aware that last year I saw exactly one showy orchis blooming on May 10 and never located it again, but I was out of town in early May last year so I've been hoping to catch them earlier in their life cycle. And so I did.

Despite its name, the showy orchis is easy to miss. The blossoms may be showy when they're fully open but the plants themselves are tiny, just five or six inches tall and surrounded by taller grasses and wildflowers. I saw the first blossom right about where I spotted last year's specimen and then two more further along the same path, and this time I took careful note of the surroundings so I can find them again later. In a few days I'll go back and see just how showy they can be, but for now I'm happy to see the blossoms just barely beginning to emerge from their tight little buds.

One of these days we'll all emerge from our tight quarters and show our true colors out in the real world. First, though, let's grade some papers.