Where the Weeds Grow: Notes on Wildness

by Curt Mellliger

We are all looking for the ultimate, something wild and beautiful beyond our wildest dreams. The reason I hit the road, went to skid row, and climbed high peaks was to search for the raw, pure holiness that I suspected permeated all of life. You see, I was not seeking religion, salvation, or even success. I was tracking down the truth. I was pursuing the source of all this. I was hunting wildness. And I found it.

I discovered it within wild deserts, wild mountain ranges, wild seashores, wild animals, and wild people. I experienced it during epic journeys, outrageous adventures, and numerous close calls with death. I witnessed it in the middle of nowhere, in the heart of the city, and in small-town alleys late at night. I felt it in the sudden surge of adrenaline, the involuntary howl at the full moon, and the sheer excitement bubbling over from inside like champagne from a shaken bottle.

Enclosed within these covers are tales of magic, of wonder, of things that last only a split second and others that endure forever. Some of the chapters are concerned with consciously confronting wildness, approaching it, touching it, and then becoming it. For to travel the almost forgotten but still available pathway to paradise is to return to the simple yet glorious joys of being free, of being untamed, of being utterly and completely alive, therefore drawing nearer, ever nearer, to our wild, oh-so-wild place of origin.

320 pages, Paperback

Published September 1, 2021

Reviews

[David Robertson · Rating 2 out of 5]

I ordered Where the Weeds Grow after reading a capsule review of "Books of Local Interest" in the Denver Post (author Curt Melliger hails from Durango, Colorado, and many of the 49 short essays comprising this book focus on Colorado and other western United States locations). I believe that Melliger is completely sincere in his writing, and he prepared this volume with the best of good intentions. However, Melliger simply is not a very good writer. As the subtitle indicates, he often muses about wildness, but his observations usually are superficial and vapid. There is a healthy mix of spirituality here, but its nature is vague and inchoate. Melliger has a habit of endlessly listing natural phenomena and observations; it gets tedious after the first few times he employs this technique. Probably the overarching problem with Melliger's writing, though, is that the reader never gets much of a sense of place; he's writing about specific locations (some of which he identifies, others of which he does not), but I never felt imbued with the surroundings.

The best essay (in this reviewer's opinion) is printed near the end of the book. "Paradise Canal" recounts Melliger's exploration of an accidental wild area that developed on rough, inaccessible, hilly spoils that were thrown up along one side of an irrigation canal in agricultural Nebraska. In this essay, his writing shines. He is specific and grounded, and the enchantment cast by the wild area shows through.

I know that a reader should never judge a book by its cover, but the book design here is off-putting. As soon as I opened the front cover, I realized that this book had been designed and printed by an independent press. Oh-oh... The font size in the prefatory materials is too large, and the line spacing and kerning in the body of the text just don't lend the book a professionally designed look.

[Britt Loves Books · Rating 2 out of 5]

Long story short, this fellow talks a lot about hanging out in the mountains, specifically the Wasatch Mountains (Rockies) in Utah and the Cascades in Oregon. Life in the present and enjoy nature.