Grass of Parnassus

Sunset Sacramento River Railway Bridge (Tomasito photo )

The Grass of Parnassus

The last time I saw this matched pair, Les and Muriel Bodine, was when I passed through Mineral on my way to Alaska and Russia in my camper in 1998. They let me park in their driveway overnight and use their bathroom as they had often done before.

Les mentioned to me that he had seen some “Grass of Parnassus” blooming beside the roadside tiny spring-fed waterfall outside of the village of Mill Creek and he asked me if I would dig up a bit of it and transplant it to the bank of the little stream in their yard. So I drove over the mountain to Mill Creek and found the pretty little plant being splashed by the waterfall just as he had described it. I dug up a few roots and transplanted them to the brook beside his house.

“Grass of Parnassus” is not really grass at all,” Les told me and showed me in his plant book that it reall was not a “true grass” botanically speaking, “but I like it anyway.”

Les and Muriel have gone on to their reward as they say—and I hope it is a big one, and I hope the bogus grass took root and is still blooming for someone on their side of the mountain.

Tomasito, 2009

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