Finding my roots among hazelnuts in the dark

How sweet it is to be loved by you

Spooky is a sliding scale. Wandering through a hazelnut orchard on a moonless night, alone, with only my headlamp for company, was equal parts exhilarating and creepy—the lower end of the spooky spectrum. My brain was on full-alert, attentive and aware, careful to keep my bearings and not get turned around as every row of trees looked the same. Once I’d walked far enough away from Walter, that my beam of light could no longer spot the big yellow adventure truck through the rows of trees, it was just me and my beating heart.

And the songs of nocturnal insects.

And the hooting of nearby owls.

And the occasional rattle of a dried hazelnut cluster breaking free from a branch, then tumbling to the dirt below with a soft thud.

The orchard was laid out with mathematical precision, trees perfectly spaced in uniform rows like someone had poked them through a gigantic sheet of graph paper. The soft brown dirt beneath the canopy was swept clean, devoid of any underbrush—a most unnatural look for a wild forest, but perfectly reasonable for a commercial orchard where nuts are harvested from the ground.

Ever since I learned about George and Lulu Dorris, relatives from one branch of my family tree (Dorris was my maiden name), I have been fascinated by hazelnut orchards. Previously, I’d been to Dorris Ranch near Springfield, Oregon, the original 268-acre plot of land George and Lulu purchased in 1892 for $4,000, now doubling as a historic parks & rec site for the curious public. It was there, after their initial five-acre experiment, that the hazelnut industry¹ first gained its footing in Oregon.

So, when a teacher friend from Salem invited us to park Walter on her family’s 2,300-acre farm for a couple of nights—specifically at their favorite campsite out by the largest of their hazelnut groves—I jumped at the chance.

Walking through the grid of trees alone, under the twinkling stars, was not something I knew I needed. But I did. My heart quickened with each quiet footfall, each row of trees I passed. The roots beneath the soil somehow tangled with my family history and pulled me deeper into the heart of the orchard, deeper into the past, deeper into a sense of belonging. As the darkness enveloped me, I felt like I had stepped into an acoustic John Denver song, “coming home to a place I’d never been before.”

I was not adrift in the history of the world. I was connected. I didn’t know it would be so important.

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At the risk of being redundant for my long-time readers, allow me to quickly bring you up to the present situation of the past twelve days:

From 1995 to 2004, Andy and I lived in Vancouver, Washington. We pretty much grew into adulthood there, started a family, plugged into a good church, got involved in the community, bought our first home. We settled. We still aren’t entirely sure why we left Vancouver, to be honest. We loved our life there and assumed it was our permanent home. But one morning when we awoke, we both just knew: if a reason arose for us to move, we would be willing to go.

A few weeks later, we found the reason. My grandfather announced he wanted to sell his Montana home—the one at the foot of the mountains, across the road from the river, where a hot summer day carries that magical aroma of pine and dust and horses, and a cold winter day is white and silent—the place where I’d savored many a pleasant vacation throughout my entire life.

Without hesitation, we sold our house in Vancouver, Washington, packed up our shop full of tools and lumber, and moved our little family—Mom, Dad, two little kids, and our Labramutt—to rural western Montana. Again, we settled in and immersed ourselves in our community and its lovely natural surroundings. Life was good.

In 2014, Andy was recruited to teach woodworking at a high school in Salem, Oregon. It was time to go again. It was a sudden change, but once again we adjusted and settled into our new life in Salem as the unofficial Mom and Dad for the whole high school where we worked.

Then COVID, that Great Disruptor, changed things up for so many people. In the summer of 2021, we realized it was time to go yet again—this time back to Montana. But this time, we weren’t ready or eager. Like an arcade claw machine filled with colorful stuffed animals, we felt unexpectedly snatched up from our comfy life in Oregon and unceremoniously plopped back down into our previous life in Montana.

For many reasons, this time we did not settle. The rugged, deep orange Ponderosa pine bark still smelled of root beer-cherry-vanilla; and the creeks, bursting their banks with the joyful chaos of spring whitewater, were as stunning as ever, but Montana was no longer our home. We didn’t belong there. We sold the homestead (albeit with some tears), bought a big commercial truck, took the utility box off the back, built a habitat box for it instead, painted it bright yellow, and called it Walter.

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Now, since mid-August, we’ve been meandering around the American West in our big adventure truck, going to events, camping off-grid, and adjusting to our new nomadic lifestyle. When we started this shakedown tour, we thought we were completely ready for this next chapter of our lives.

But we couldn’t have anticipated the impact of detouring back through Vancouver and Salem—a planned one-week trip that stretched into nearly two. This last twelve days has taken us by surprise. We didn’t see it coming. And we are blown away.

Friends:

• We didn’t know our bodies were starved for affection until you, our old friends (and our former students, too!) offered us your best hugs. So many hugs.

• We didn’t realize we were so parched, sitting by the deep well of lost connections, until you turned the crank, pulled up the bucket, and offered us a drink of its cold, clear water.

• We couldn’t have imagined how good it would be to sit in your homes or have you over to sit with us in our little home on wheels, our conversation refreshingly intimate, effortless, and honest.

• We had no idea our hearts were so depleted, so desperate for shared history, for fellowship, for communion.

• We hadn’t realized our lives had impacted so many people over the years, but you showed us how they had.

• We didn’t have a clue that so many people still loved us after all the moves, all the changes.

And those photos are only a selection. I don’t have enough room for all of them. Please don’t be offended if yours wasn’t featured here. One of us might have had our eyes closed or a goofy expression on our face. (You’re welcome.)

We thought we would just pop into both Salem and Vancouver and say hello to a few folks, drive by our old stomping grounds in each place, then move on down the road. But this little walk down memory lane was so much more than a stopover. It was a launching pad. It was a chance for renewal and a refilling of our emotional fuel tanks.

You fed us.

You blessed us.

You prayed over us.

You commissioned us and sent us out.

Our hearts are full; our souls are refreshed.

Like a starlight stroll through a slightly spooky hazelnut orchard, we didn’t know we needed this time with you, but we did. We didn’t know it would connect us back to our past, but it did. We didn’t understand how much we need roots, but we do. We didn’t know this brief visit would strengthen us for the road to come, but it has. And it’s not only the Salem/Vancouver folk, either: we have had so many wonderful conversations with old friends in Colorado, Idaho, and central Oregon, family in Utah, and a handful of others here and there.

Thank you.

Now, with renewed strength and vision, we’re considering what will come next in our journey. We need to return to Montana first to wrap up a few loose ends. We need to travel to South Dakota to become residents there, as their laws favor full-time travelers. Beyond that, we have so many options before we head to Alaska, planned for May 2025.

What if we went to assist with hurricane recovery efforts in North Carolina or Florida? We are long-term off-grid capable and have no conflicting time commitments, so it might be an ideal match for us. The needs are so great, and we have been blessed by so many—we’d love to return the favor, as we are able. We’re currently in the brainstorming and dreaming stage and would love to hear your thoughts and ideas. Perhaps this is where your partnership with the Diesel & Dignity Fund (thank you, paid subscribers!) will come into play. Hmm . . . thinking . . . thinking . . .

Until next week,

Sherry

1. While most of the world’s hazelnuts come from Turkey, the Oregon region surrounding the original Dorris Ranch produces 99% of the hazelnuts grown in the United States. Here is an article about the history of the industry in the Pacific Northwest, with a sizable section on George and Lulu’s original dream. Here is a more scientific article about the hazelnut developed at Oregon State University in 2012, a superior hybrid they named Dorris.