Journal 13

Tony and I were out of bed early this morning. I have been sleeping so well. I think it is the constant fresh air. Tony was getting ready to go hunting with the men when Palesa stopped him in his tracks and said that she had a different chore for the both of us today. Tony was a little disappointed, but he didn’t argue. I think Palesa is trying to match make. She thinks she is being sneaky, but she isn’t. Palesa sent Tony and me grocery shopping today to collect berries, mushrooms, wild onions, and hickory nuts. It was our chore for the day, and I enjoyed it. Palesa drew a couple of nice pictures to show us what we were looking for. It was a fun adventure if you don’t include the invasion of ants that attacked Tony while he was up one of the trees and the large spider that climbed up my arm while I was picking berries.

You should have seen Tony climb the trees. At first, I was thinking we were going to return to the village without the nuts but after a few tries Tony made it up into the trees. Palesa told us not to collect the nuts off the ground (she made sure we understood this point) because they were usually rotten and often contain more insects than the nuts still on the trees. The berries were simple to collect and Palesa said if we picked only the mushroom, she had drawn we wouldn’t pick anything deadly. She suggested we didn’t sample any until we returned to the village just to be safe. It has been a very good day.