There was a bear outside my bedroom window earlier tonight. He was quiet, but I heard him rooting around in my truck. I’d heard him every night for the past week or ten days. Then sometimes I’d hear him rustling in the bushes when I’d go out to have a look around in the morning. I went out earlier tonight, about three o’clock. My dog, Chica, was pretty riled, exercising her protective nature. I took her outside to check on things, to allow her to investigate the cause of her concern. It was pretty dark, but it was cool to see her taking control, beginning at the truck, and fanning outward, nose to the ground, working overtime, then stopping and pointing, indicating the direction the bear headed into the bushes. She’d growl a warning, stop and listen for a response, then continue about her business. The bear left three or four big piles of scat a few feet from the truck, just to distract the dog, I presume. Or to mark some territory. Or just to say hello. I can’t really tell you what’s so exciting about that, but it is. Something about co-existence I think.
I’m sitting on the deck now, between bear time and sunrise, there’s just a glimmer of light beginning to come over the hills to the east. I’m waiting for the coyote’s early morning visit to the water trough. Call me an insomniac, I don’t care, but I live for moments like these. Special times, intimate times when nature reveals itself unbeknownst even to itself. The birds are waking up, calling quietly to those still lost in slumber, the early risers prodding the late sleepers to get up before they miss the very best part of the day. I think they call it anthropomorphism when one gives human traits, behaviors, and characteristics to animals. But hey, at least I can spell anthropomorphism, and if I can spell it I ought to be able to indulge in it.
I keep forgetting my Doberman pup is a dog. She’s five months old, but is so smart I take for granted that she knows what I’m saying, and there is ample evidence that she, in fact, usually does. I know, everybody says that about their dog.
Must be something to it.
After sunrise:
I found bear prints on the ground after it began to get light this morning, and paw prints on my truck. Looks like a juvenile, maybe a year or two old. I think there may even be two or three of them visiting together. Probably don’t yet know where my refrigerator is.
On another note, I’ve been looking at a lot of footprints lately, on my property, and at the different lakes in the area when I’m out in the early morning; fascinating indicators of life, of patterns of behavior, of travel unobserved by anyone except the other night creatures. They come and go, confident there will be no humans interrupting their routines. It is a world most of us know little about, myself included. It is a world that exists parallel to our own, but intertwined with ours as well. We work and play, they sleep. We sleep, they forage and play.
As people, we leave footprints too. The things we say, the things we do, our attitudes, our relationships, they are all read by others, and they are indicators of who we are.
Let us all step lightly, carefully,
and with every good intention.
Speaking of footprints, my daughter-in-law Amy, and her friend Katie Fox, have a new business. Check it out.
http://bloomingfootprint.com
