What-Do-You-Know -- A Deer

November 11, 2010.  Thursday.

Situation:  I hadn’t expected it, but my workplace is closed today, so, except for errands, I have no work to do.  Moi plans on going to Ezra’s land where she’ll be hunting deer in a couple weeks, and she asked me if I wanted to go with her.  I thought I would, for a change from my usual routine.  (On the way to and from, I have to listen to Moi talk about the details of hunting: how Ezra has been packing her shells incorrectly and she’s afraid to say anything to him, how some of the tree stands are falling down and need repaired, how she herself walks like a deer in the woods, deer pausing a lot while they roam, and slipping their hooves under the leaves instead of crunching them from on top – not five minutes into the woods, we see a flock of turkeys, and Moi sees three deer -- it makes my walks with Mway sound like a quick jaunt through Washington Square Park.)  Tomorrow, because I can’t do any work today, I’ll probably have to make up for it then, plus I have work tomorrow night; I might only be able to squeeze in a quick walk.  Saturday I’m finally scheduled to take a DUI class.  This is the last chance I have to take it, or else my year of ARD could be revoked.  The class runs from 9 to 6, so I won’t be able to take Mway for a walk on Saturday.  I still have to run my errands today, but hopefully when I’m done with that, I’ll be able to take Mway for a good walk.  Mway and Moi have gone for their naps.  I go on my errand.  Shortly after I get back, Moi and Mway wake up; it’s now 2:42, and I’m going to take Mway out now.

State of the Path:  Hear McChildren playing in a distant yard.  Mway runs through the chickens; they scramble, bucking.  The leaves from the poolside maple are drying, shriveling.  I make a loud crunching sound as I walk over them.  Take the side path.  The sun is just at the topmost branches of the black walnuts.  All-wing insects dancing here and there.  There aren’t as many leaves on the path here, and I wonder how quiet I am being, step through the monkey vine portal, when, what do you know, up from near the cedar jumps what looks like a big doe, charges loudly through the brush into Hutchinson’s field.  Mway hears it, and runs up toward the path where it would have passed, sniffing.  She knows some animal bounded through here, but I don’t think she knows exactly what it was.  With my walking stick, I beat back some dry goldenrod leaning into the path.  At the wigwams, I have to reach down the back of my pants and scratch my ass.  The maple leaves on the ground here are shriveling also, shrinking in size so the dirt’s almost visible.  Along the creek, scare out among the oaks a flock of those birds I think of as mourning doves – I wish they’d make a mournful sound so I knew for sure that’s what they are.  Walk across the plank, round the crest of the skating pond.  Note that the Russian olive leaves (if they are Russian olives) (like the honeysuckles they are still green and on the shrubs) look crinkled, with lots of edges so they look like holly leaves; wonder if what I thought was holly the other day is really just smaller growths of Russian olives (or whatever they are).

State of the Creek:  At the log jam, I pause to stare into the water, wondering what new thing I could possibly say about the creek today.  Suddenly I realize I’m standing next to a little cloud of gnats – I believe I can call these gnats – and move on.  Below the locust trees, the film I noticed on the water the other day seems to have accumulated into the middle of the pool into a patch of scum that looks like a piece of thin floating ice.

The Fetch:  I first throw the stick toward the edge of the clearing, but as time goes on I throw it further and further into the dry brown goldrenrod.  Tiny pieces of goldenrod fuzz that Mway has stirred up float past me in the sun.  At one point as Mway’s holding the stick in her mouth waiting for me to say “put it down,” I lean forward and glare at her, and she shifts her eyes (but I don’t know if it’s because I’m glaring at her or if she thinks she hears something).  When Mway starts dawdling in the goldenrod, I figure she’s had enough and turn around to head to the house.  Back inside I tell Moi that I saw a deer.  She wonders how Mway responded and then she starts telling me about the habits of deer, “They’re coming out late in the afternoon now.  They move according to the moon.  I’m going to have to tell Matt when he goes hunting to stay awake after lunch…”