Jewelweed In Bloom

It was a cloudy, cold, dreary day on the mountain yesterday. The high was 57. Fortunately, the rain held off. Today is a different story. We awoke to a beautiful blue sky. It is looking like a gorgeous day to hike the mountain. The jewelweed is starting to bloom around the lodge. Just in time. I have a few spots of poison ivy that are begging for some relief. The leaves and the juice from the stem of the plant are used as a natural treatment for poison ivy. I learned about jewelweed, or also known as "touch me not", from a mountain man my parents met on a family vacation. My dad was into geodes and he met a man in Franklin, North Carolina who said he would take us geode hunting. I was around 8 or 9 years old. He showed us natural springs, geodes, and he taught us about "touch me not", or "tach me naught" as he called it. To this day, every time I see jewelweed, I think of that old mountain man.