A Letter To A Friend

O.M.G. What is the penalty for hit and run? You can imagine how I felt after this dream I had about Harry Dresden racing down an old dusty dirt road, which for some reason seemed to be in Iowa. Harry was being chased by the Lord of Thorns, an enormous centaur like creature from a Simon R. Green book that seemed to be something like Cenarius of WoW druid lore. Well in the book Hex and the City, the Lord of Thorns lived in a box and looked like an angst ridden teenage Bromley Contingent from south London with a full rack of antlers sprouting from his head, but in my dream is it any surprise that it would take on a WoW hue and flavor?. A massive Cerynian Hind was charging and bashing his little V.W. relentlessly when I woke in a cold sweat. Unsettled, I grabbed my keys and drove down to the local Slurpy-mart for a fountain soda pop and a (shh…) discretionary Klondike bar.

As I drove back home looking at the tunnel of black that ate away at my night vision, I thought of you driving alone when a deer leaped out at your car, when a deer leaped out and struck the hindquarter of my truck. You know the drill, my heart leapt to my throat closing off any breath, and panic filled my mind as guilt flooded my conscience and I slowly turned my vehicle around in the street to go back to the scene. There lay a hapless little doe and I felt like crying for the poor critter, but against my instinct to rush out to see if it was ok, I stayed in my truck and drove home. Call me a coward, call me cautious, but I’ve seen the “When Deer Attack” video commercials, so I remained inside my truck until I got home. I ran my hand over the slight indentation that marked yet another scar of experience on my GMC, and pulled the little tufts of hair from the back wheel well where they clung to the rim like a cutaway from a CSI trailer and I wondered if I shouldn’t be wearing plastic gloves and using evidence bags.

I came into the house and went directly to the phone book to look up animal control. At three A.M. I didn’t really want to misdial some poor hard working slob trying to sleep who may just remember *69 in the light of day and turn all Stephen King on my butt by, I don’t know, passing on a family curse or psychically stalking me in my nightmares or something really bad. So I looked up the number and dialed it. Big surprise the office was closed and a pleasant recording gave me another number to call. Now as I was going through this diligent process I became aware that my two kitties had joined forces to circle me slowly in a stalking formation and I really wished I hadn’t brought Stephen King to mind at this wee hour of the morning when everything is so eerily quiet and nasty things seem to happen in his books. But I realized that I had inadvertently marked my self with the scent of an injured animal (I guess I really should have considered plastic gloves) and my cats were reverting to their base natures, Chaos always hungry and Nutmeg half wild as she is, seemed to like me now but maybe not in such a kind way. I dialed rapidly hoping to complete my task at hand and reach the showers before something distasteful occurred within the confines of my house. The new number was the local police department and after wading thru a series of recordings that kept insisting I call 911, but only if I have an emergency, I was connected to dispatch. I confessed my tragic tale and prayed I didn’t violate any public ordinances only to realize from the direction the interrogation was taking it was becoming more and more unlikely. She asked me if I was certain it was a deer and not a large dog, and I explained that although old and addled, I still could delineate between Fido and Bambi and that yea, although it was small, a doe a deer a female deer, it was in the middle of the road and very much a hazard.

She acknowledged and accepted my expertise and informed me that if that was the case I had the wrong number, she only had the capacity to take reports on domestic animals and serious crimes like burglary or rape, and that I would need to contact the Sheriff’s Department. I considered asking her what if the deer raped me and stole a hubcap, but quietly and submissively thanked the kind lady for her time and left her to her crossword puzzles.

The Sheriff’s office was not the right people to contact either, but more helpful when the late night dispatcher began a thoughtful and thorough investigation into the proper channels for such a report and promised she would take care of the details for me and that I could rest assured that the county was in good hands and that I could relax with her on the job. I felt surrounded by a sense of security as I fended off my kitties with my cane and I heard the dispatcher shout into the background, “Hey Hank, what’s the number to animal control?” as I hung up the phone.

The weird thing was the impending sense of the incident I had starting the moment I woke from my dream about deer people attacking a Volkswagon, which brought to mind your several encounters with stray deer just as a deer leaped out at me. The fact that the deer struck me didn’t strike me with shock, I almost expected it, the fright came from my anticipation. I always get the willies when I know what is going to happen before it does. I feel bad for the deer, but I feel worse in that I wonder could I have saved the deer’s life if I only could give credence to prescience? For all that I love to read about it I guess when it comes right down to it I really don’t believe in signs or portents. Someone once told me denial isn’t just a river of regret any more... Don't ask, it's 4 A.M. I didn't understand when I heard it before, and I'm not sure what I mean by it now.