January 2, 2024
It was my first day back to work, and the four o’clock alarm came quick. After a cup of coffee, I did some morning reading from Plato’s Republic before writing in my journal. We left the house at a quarter to six for an early morning yoga class at the YMCA in Wilson.
Yoga was excellent. Although we had to leave a little early in to make it to work on time, the drive to class was well worth it. The teacher used a stiff foam roller with which we rolled out our upper and lower backs. My back popped several times, sounding like the cracking of frozen snow when you walk on it. I left class feeling relaxed and loose.
When we arrived home, my wife rushed to change clothes, eat a quick breakfast, prepare her lunch, and get out the door. I had a slower morning, since it was still a couple of hours before my work would begin. I went to the woods for a walk, with plans to check the trail cameras along the way.
The morning air was crisp, and the light was soft, making me to miss my morning walks at the lake. During the recent holidays, we made a habit of being at the lake for sunrises, something that I already missed on the first day back to work. The trail cameras captured a fox, a pair of raccoons, and a whitetail doe. At the back of the property, there were two large feeding bowls full of deer corn. The deer had not touched this feed, probably because they didn’t trust the bowls, which stood out as strangers to the natural environment. Yesterday, while in the woods, my wife kicked over both bowls and spilled the corn out on the ground to see if the deer would eat it.
This morning, the corn was completely gone. This worried me because it was a level of feeding I had not previously seen. Did the deer have enough food? The local farmers harvested all the crop fields last month, and I wondered if food sources were scarce. When I arrived back at my house, I pulled out my last forty-pound bag of deer corn and carried it into the woods, pouring small piles of corn in various locations. I decided I would go to grab more feed during lunch.
Work, after a vacation, is always busy. There were emails to catch up on, and monthly reporting to complete for December. The day went pretty smoothly, though.
During lunch, I left the house to run some quick errands, taking the trash to the trash service center, picking up medication for one of my dogs at the veterinary clinic, and stopping by the feed store, where I picked up two hundred and forty pounds of deer corn.
After work, I shot my bow for about thirty minutes, practicing at twenty, thirty, and forty yards. At twenty yards, I pulled a Robin Hood, hitting the back of one of my new arrows with another arrow. It sounds cool, but it broke a brand new arrow. That shot cost me fourteen dollars and twenty-five cents. Ouch.
At dusk, all of my dogs sounded, so I looked out my office window and saw four deer feeding in the pasture in front of my house. I quieted the dogs and looked out my window again, using my rangefinder to see the deer more clearly. I counted five deer, then eight; then ten. While a few different herds travel through my property, I had not seen a herd this large. I knew then why the corn had been disappearing so quickly. I had a lot of hungry mouths to feed. The deer stayed in or near the pasture for several hours, some of them standing at the exact location where I had shot my bow earlier.
They say you take on the qualities of those you hang out with most. I hope my time here in the woods brings me the wildness of nature.