Tuesday, January 6, 2009

New Year Deer


Sleet bounces off the garage roof like popcorn. The sky is the color of lint, and the naked trees are the color of dust, so I hope enough snow falls today to cover some surfaces with white, to break up the monotony.

K's backyard deer don't seem fazed by the sleet. One stands guard in the woods while four others settle into a green bed of leafy ground-cover. The deer are the color of dust as well, their necks thick like tree trunks. I watched one drop down onto its front knees before collapsing its hind legs and thudding to the ground. Not at all graceful, this ancient and vulnerable maneuver. I suddenly thought of dinosaurs, though I know they aren't related. Perhaps I'm remembering a detail from Jurassic Park animators.

When the deer don't move, they become completely invisible. They must have decided I'm okay, even though I appear periodically in the window. They allow me to peer out at them in my bright blue shirt.

3 comments:

Hilarym99 said...

When I was a kid, my brothers, sister and I went out to the woods in the back all the time.

One day, we went back, took a blanket and some sunscreen. Laid out the blanket and squirted sunscreen all around it, deciding for some reason in through the use of kid-logic that it would attract animals.

It did.

A deer came up to us that day. I mean, really came up to us. So close I could have reached out and touched it. Standing, right next to the blanket, and four innocent children who didn't make a move, just existed, next to that creature.

It was magical.

If you ask my brother what attracted the deer, to this day he'll tell you suntan lotion.

Miss you Gasket. ;)

WorkerBee said...

Glad you are back

Tom Manoff said...

I killed a deer with my truck. Driving at about 50 mph on a mountain highway it just jumped gracefully into the front of the truck and bounced off dead. Strange experience at that speed. Almost slow motion.