I just finished reading a short story by James Michener in which he followed the life of a Pacific salmon from birth to death and then I turned on my TV this morning and there was a National Geographic show about the same salmon. Michener’s story featured one salmon and how it grew, survived and managed to return to its particular place to lay its eggs and then die. The TV program told of how this river was damned and the whole fishing industry was destroyed and the salmon almost disappeared but the natives along the river fought for 100 years until the dam was actually blown up and the whole cycle of salmon life was restored. Michener didn’t mention any of that but I probably should check the dates of the story and the dam and see how they happened in relation to one another.
If you’re not a reader I apologize but again I just read one of a collection of what was titled Survival Stories. I think that’s where the salmon story came from but another one of my favorites is To Build a Fire by Jack London about a man who did not believe that he was in danger of the cold in Alaska and trekked alone with only a dog in sub zero weather. At one point the man built a fire with his last match, got a small blaze going and too late, realized he had built it under a tree branch which heated and dropped snow on the fire, putting it out. I swear I actually moaned when that little fire was snuffed out.
Lately, I’ve been learning so much from my Cecilia friend about hummingbirds and now I’m learning about salmon. Just no end to things I didn’t know!
