Salmonberries Quotes

“The new owners of the South Valley Street house, who described themselves online as people who "love dancing, practicing selfrealization, meditation, freedom, and investing," turned the Kardonsky-Cook home into an Airbnb. They named it "A Creek Runs Through It Olympic Mountain Retreat." It was one of the four properties they had purchased to rent around the Olympic Peninsula. The listing described the house as a "historic luxury two-story farmhouse" and charged guests $190 a night to sleep in the rooms where my family once lived.

A big selling point for their property was the creek that my grandmother and her siblings played in, that my mother explored before picking salmonberries from the bushes on its bank. They marketed the home as being close to the waterfront that my great-grandfather walked to every day for work. He was a longshoreman and worked at the docks the entire time he lived there. His cat met him halfway home after every shift.

One review read, "It doesn't feel like someone fixed up a house and is renting it, it feels like someone's home.”
― Leah Myers, Thinning Blood: A Memoir of Family, Myth, and Identity

“Salmonberries?” It’s early in the year for the berries that grow wild in the Pacific Northwest woods. They look like bright orangey-yellow raspberries. They’re rare, with a mild, delicate flavor.
“Thought maybe you could use them for your chocolates,”Jakob explains, his tone clipped. For some reason he won’t meet my eyes.
“Oh.” I’m touched by the thoughtful gesture. “Thank you.”
I touch the fragile berries gently with a fingertip. What if I replaced the huckleberry gelée with salmonberry in my dark chocolate and huckleberry bonbons? And maybe add ginger? Crystallized ginger for a crunchy little kick? It would be unique, and very Northwestern.”
― Rachel Linden, A Sprinkle of Sweet Serendipity