poppies

"Humans are creatures in search of exultation," Ellen Meloy writes. Exultation = the Lake Elsinore poppy fields. Saturday. Cold. Misty rain. Windy . . . Less than ideal conditions to photograph fields of Eschscholzia californica. Fields of glorious unopened poppies. Poppies that at 6:15 am don't put us to sleep but whose neon orange jolts us wide awake. Rose, Joe and I are in search of exultation in the form of wildflowers, masses of them. Yesterday, on a reconnaissance mission, we had found canterbury bells (Phacelia campanularia) off the I-15 on Main Street exit, yellow fiddlenecks and canterbury bells on the Nichols exit, and poppies, thousands of poppies, on Lake Street. Today, we're positioned to photograph as the sun comes up over the mountains in the east. Full sun had been predicted, but it's inordinately cloudy, Through my macro lens, I photograph the dew as it clings to the poppies. The hour of the wolf is the time before sunrise when bird song stimulates plants to drink morning dew. The hour of the wolf is also the time when we should be sipping our lattes (this is southern California). We're wet and cold, but we photograph the poppies for over an hour.
I'm smitten by one blue dicks, aka wild hyacinth, growing in the midst of the poppies. We discuss the next time we'll come back, when the conditions will be ideal. For wildflower addicts, there's always a next time, another exultation.

On the west side of the I-15, we find El Comal, a small Salvadoran restaurant with pupusas stuffed with cheese and squash and beans. I tell Rose and Joe how I travelled to El Salvador 24 years ago in 1984 to attend a conference sponsored by Co-Madres, Mothers of the Disappeared. The desaparecidos were labor leaders, peasant organizers, student demonstrators, human rights activists, anyone with a progressive agenda who defied the U.S. trained military/paramilitary and the U.S. supported government in power. Anyone who defied our sphere of influence, our vital interests, our investment climate, our national security . . . Humans are creatures in search of human rights, social justice, life without death squads or state-sanctioned torture.

In search of a life with pupusas and wildflower fields, morning dew and exultation.