Sitting at the kitchen counter, with the laptop, 1 AM. Headphones on, but no music at the moment, just a dim electronic hiss waiting to be upstaged by a song. I hear a muffled howl, like a dog of some sort. Annette must have the TV turned loud upstairs, I figure. She's sleeping, so I'll go turn it off, I figure. I get up, but the bedroom is dark - no TV. I hear the howl again, but much louder and clearer without the headphones on. I've heard it before so I bolt outside. Coyote.
We live in a village but we're on the fringe, and my yard backs up to a woodlot beyond which are some open fields that are loosely connected to other fields that are out in the country. I've seen one of the bastards in my backyard in daylight, which is disconcerting because I have a small dog who is perfect happy-meal size. I walked to the back of my yard to the edge of the woods to listen. This guy is just beyond the woodlot, in the row of pines alongside the small playground back there, maybe 200 ft. away. He seems to be alone. And he's fired up: bark bark howl, bark howl....bark bark bark howl. The moon is 80% full, wispy clouds running by, cold as the devil, crusty snow underfoot, long shadows from the trees on the silver ground. Real Hound of the Baskervilles stuff. He howls once more, but it sounds like a slightly different spot this time and it gave me one of those serious spine shivers. Then I hear leaves rustling like now he's moving in the woods, and closer. That's all I need to hear, and I hightail back inside.
I got that shiver once before in Canada, at Timberwolf Lake, early 70s. A several-day canoe trip deep into the woods, including portages up to a mile long. Me and Gilmore and I think one other guy. One of those trips where we really achieved that sense of isolation that we always went for back then. The moon was also big that night, it was calm, and a pack of wolves set to wailing for quite a while, and I'll never forget that scary-ass sound because it gave me that shiver. We went back to that lake years later hoping for a rerun but it was a windy night and we never heard the wolves.
When we first moved to this house, there was a pair of great horned owls that must have resided pretty close by because they'd hang around and hoot back and forth to each other every 3rd or 4th night. But they left after a couple of years and never came back. It was a nice county touch to our village setting that was too short-lived. So it's nice to hear something like a coyote once in a while, just to help offset the psychological impact of all the gigantic clear-cutting developments this town is fostering lately.
His presence don't befront me none, but he better leave my dog alone.
We live in a village but we're on the fringe, and my yard backs up to a woodlot beyond which are some open fields that are loosely connected to other fields that are out in the country. I've seen one of the bastards in my backyard in daylight, which is disconcerting because I have a small dog who is perfect happy-meal size. I walked to the back of my yard to the edge of the woods to listen. This guy is just beyond the woodlot, in the row of pines alongside the small playground back there, maybe 200 ft. away. He seems to be alone. And he's fired up: bark bark howl, bark howl....bark bark bark howl. The moon is 80% full, wispy clouds running by, cold as the devil, crusty snow underfoot, long shadows from the trees on the silver ground. Real Hound of the Baskervilles stuff. He howls once more, but it sounds like a slightly different spot this time and it gave me one of those serious spine shivers. Then I hear leaves rustling like now he's moving in the woods, and closer. That's all I need to hear, and I hightail back inside.
I got that shiver once before in Canada, at Timberwolf Lake, early 70s. A several-day canoe trip deep into the woods, including portages up to a mile long. Me and Gilmore and I think one other guy. One of those trips where we really achieved that sense of isolation that we always went for back then. The moon was also big that night, it was calm, and a pack of wolves set to wailing for quite a while, and I'll never forget that scary-ass sound because it gave me that shiver. We went back to that lake years later hoping for a rerun but it was a windy night and we never heard the wolves.
When we first moved to this house, there was a pair of great horned owls that must have resided pretty close by because they'd hang around and hoot back and forth to each other every 3rd or 4th night. But they left after a couple of years and never came back. It was a nice county touch to our village setting that was too short-lived. So it's nice to hear something like a coyote once in a while, just to help offset the psychological impact of all the gigantic clear-cutting developments this town is fostering lately.
His presence don't befront me none, but he better leave my dog alone.
1 comment:
I LOVE this! Great writing...I love the Marge post too. Thanks for sharing :)
Post a Comment