The other day I ran across a giant pile of bamboo stalks, recently cut.

I'm sure many people will agree with me that although bamboo has "gone native" here in the U.S., there's still something exotic about its lines and shapes. A bamboo forest is unlike anything I grew up with, in temperate New England; conifers and oaks were more of the visual texture in which I made my home.

And I'm consistently surprised when subtle changes in the landscape can make me feel more or less at home. Traveling southward, I can tell that the vegetation has changed without close examination; as hills rush past, the cumulative effect of less-familiar species creates a unique taste and feel.

Bamboo will always be foreign to me.