{"id":173,"date":"2020-10-27T11:42:50","date_gmt":"2020-10-27T18:42:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/wordpress\/?p=173"},"modified":"2026-08-20T19:33:07","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T02:33:07","slug":"blog-mushroom-meeting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/2020\/10\/27\/blog-mushroom-meeting\/","title":{"rendered":"Mushroom Meeting in the Bean Patch"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"et_pb_section_0 et_pb_section et_section_regular et_block_section\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_row_0 et_pb_row et_block_row\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_column_0 et_pb_column et_pb_column_4_4 et-last-child et_block_column et_pb_css_mix_blend_mode_passthrough\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_image_0 et_pb_image et_pb_module et_block_module\"><span class=\"et_pb_image_wrap\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Terri-Rottman-2020-Mushrooms-770px.jpg\" alt=\"Photo of mushrooms\" title=\"Mushrooms in Bean Patch, 2020\" \/><\/span><\/div>\n\n<div class=\"et_pb_text_0 et_pb_text et_pb_bg_layout_light et_pb_module et_block_module\"><div class=\"et_pb_text_inner\"><p>One October evening I wandered through the garden, doing some late season harvesting. As I shifted the leaves on my bean plants, I noticed this little cluster of mushrooms growing next to the edge of the bed. I believe these are yellow stainers which are not edible but can be quite cute in their early stages. I took a few pictures and later did a drawing of them in my journal.<\/p>\n<p>It looked as if they were all clustered together having a meeting, something I have a lot of experience with from my corporate career days. We had so many meetings that an \u201cEffective Meetings\u201d class was required training for all employees. I reminisced a bit and thought about how meetings could run the full spectrum from boring to stressful to inspiring and energizing to laughing until your sides hurt. For all its messiness, spending time with co-workers, friends, and family has always given me life\u2019s greatest moments.<\/p>\n<p>Anyway, I drew the mushrooms looking pretty much as they did in my photo, and next to this I did a second version, imagining what the meeting version might look like. Here is a little story to go with it:<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n<div class=\"et_pb_blurb_0 et_pb_blurb et_pb_bg_layout_light et_pb_blurb_position_top et_pb_module et_flex_module\"><div class=\"et_pb_blurb_content et_flex_module\"><div class=\"et_pb_main_blurb_image et_animated\"><span class=\"et_pb_image_wrap et_pb_only_image_mode_wrap\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Terri-Rottman-NJ-Mushroom-Meeting-2020-Watercolor-Pencil-770px.jpg\" alt=\"2020 nature journal page with mushroom meeting\" \/><\/span><\/div><div class=\"et_pb_blurb_container\"><div class=\"et_pb_blurb_description\"><p>Nestled in the corner of the vegetable bed, hiding beneath the beans, the mushroom family was having a meeting. Smoke from the neighbor\u2019s chimney wafted through the garden making it difficult to see the sky. Mushroom #1 droned on in her know-it-all tone. Mushroom #2 next to her had a pained expression on her face. Mushroom #3 thought \u201cshe is so full of beans\u201d (which was appropriate given their location). Mushroom #4\u2019s attention was elsewhere, her brood of laughing, screeching children running chaotically around her. Mushroom #5 did his best to ignore them all and listen attentively. He was the only one in the family that hung on Mushroom # 1\u2019s every word. Mushroom #6 looked up and gasped as a hummingbird appeared to be flying straight toward him. The bird veered off at the last minute and hovered above mushroom number #1 drinking nectar from the bean flowers. When it had finished, it hovered for a moment longer and looked down at mushroom # 1 as if listening. Its little body gave the smallest of movements, leaving a splat on mushroom #1\u2019s forehead. Or perhaps this was just wishful thinking on the part of Mushroom #2.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One October evening I wandered through the garden, doing some late season harvesting. As I shifted the leaves on my bean plants, I noticed this little cluster of mushrooms growing next to the edge of the bed seemingly deep in conversation&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":894,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55,21,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fungi","category-gardening","category-nature-journaling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=173"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1203,"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173\/revisions\/1203"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/894"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willowsongways.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}