Earth Star Adventure

Today I told a friend a little story (that would be the friend who shares a love with me - owl pellets,) and thought you might enjoy this one.  Hopefully it will make you smile.  WARNING - I'm giving you the spoiler!  I didn't die.

One day my son (he was about ten at the time) and I were hiking in our Illinois woods.  We came upon some earth stars scattered about (look em up, they're fascinating.) Finding them wonderfully intriguing as usual, we stopped to give each one a squeeze so we could watch the spores fly.

I gave one too big of a squeeze and a cloud of spores shot right into my face!  Immediately they made me feel ill, so I told my son I was done and it was time to walk back up to the house.  On the way, the entire lining of my mouth and throat opened up and saliva literally POURED out of my mouth - I don't know how it was possible that so much came out!  I was getting really sick and he had to lead me, hunched over, leaking, with a roiling stomach, up out of the woods.

Even though I was feeling terrible, I can still remember being fascinated that my body had turned on a faucet full blast, and wondering how this could possibly happen.  Always was the curious sort.  It was a very long walk uphill, and I was wondering if I was going to make it.  I could already see the headlines: "Woman Dies in Woods from Sniffing Earth Stars."  By the time we did get out of the woods, I was feeling lightheaded, but a little better. My body had apparently put up its defenses and cleansed itself of the poison. Wow!  What a God we have to make our bodies so complex!  After an hour, I was pretty much back to normal.  Well, MY normal.

To this day, I haven't squeezed another earth star.  

Don't recommend it.

And now, I'm curious.  How many of you knew what earth stars were before reading this?  Did you look them up? :)