Deer me!

This one I’ll have to hold in my heart – no photos.

I had a wonderful encounter with a doe this morning – white-tailed deer. Bren and I see deer in Westport maybe a couple times a year on average, but they’re usually fleeting glimpses. This was more encounter than sighting.

I was on my morning walk on Drift Road and as I glanced down a dirt lane towards the woods, there she was, casually strolling towards me up a hill, about 40-feet away. I froze and held my breath. I did not raise the binoculars. She was close enough to study with the naked eye, coming closer, and I didn’t want to startle her.

She paused a couple of times. Looked for something on the ground. Looked cautiously in my direction. Sniffed the wind. Twisted her ears. I suspect both radar and sonar were working, but she apparently didn’t detect anything. What a gorgeous creature in her soft brown and white coat! What a graceful creature walking delicately on her thin, but strong legs! I just stood there and drank it in.

She got to the top of the hill and slowly, methodically, took a left turn into the cornfield. I was shocked. In an instant she had vanished in corn that simply isn’t that high yet. But I had had a solid two or three minutes with her up to that point and she had gotten as close as 30-feet. After watching the cornfield a minute or two for any sign of her, I resumed my walk up the road – but not before pausing, folding my hands before me, and giving her a respectful bow, wherever she was.

I felt for a brief moment I truly shared her morning. Then she startled me. Now perhaps 20-feet away, her head suddenly appeared above the corn, looking directly at me. She paused, she moved her ears again – perhaps she sniffed. Then she was gone, but I could hear her crashing through the corn. “Boom” and she was up out of the corn, her body fully visible in a leap as she headed towards the woods at full speed. Now 60-feet away. Invisible again. More noise. “Crash” she’s up in full view, bounding over the corn, and back down again. Then she’s gone, down the hill, towards the woods, out of sight.

I’m sorry if I gave her a start. Hope she has a good day. I know that in some areas white-tail deer are common these days. I know that in many places they have become a pest, destroying trees, and a danger as they cross roads and are struck by cars. (Yes, cars usually get the best of these accidents, but people can certainly get hurt in such a case.)

there were othe good things this morning - a playful flock of chicadees, another small group of yellow warblers, and a mocking bird that was determined to give me his complete repertorie. He started as I approached, and as I passed he seemed to be crying after me - "Wait, wait! Have you heard this one? What about this one? Can you guess who I am now?"

But joyful as the birds were, for me the encounter with the deer was holy communion. A chance encounter with a wild creature on a beautiful morning – and a renewed sense that I too am just another wild creature, set for a time, on this hospitable planet. And while I think of the nuisance destruction that deer do, I am sadly reminded that it is nothing compared to the wanton destruction, intentional and otherwise, done by members of my species.

Posted by Greg Stone at July 18, 2003 07:21 AM