The Deerstalker

Now that I know they are up there on the hill behind the house, I can feel them looking down. Watching, waiting, patiently. Someday, someone will walk back up the hill and this time they won't stare at them, watch them from behind the rhododendrons, and then follow in their snowshoe tracks. No, next time those carnivorous deer will stalk that walker and take them down.

I first learned of the stalker deer innocently enough. After waiting 30 minutes on a snowy morning for a train that never came I decided to call it a day and go snowshoeing. The roads being impassable, the only place to go was up the trail onto the town land behind the house. I've walked up to the Powder House, and written about it before. It's a nice little walk up to a point of land over looking Manchester. But on this morning as I was fluffing through the 12 inches of fresh powder on the trail I suddenly felt eyes on me and looking up saw a herd of deer gathered around the Powder House. Awww. How beautiful, and how lucky I was to see them before they ran off. I slowly walked forward hoping to get closer but knowing that at any moment they'd bolt. But they didn't. In fact the biggest one actually stepped toward me. He was big. I stopped. He took another step. I took a step. He took a step. This was weird. I waved my arms and the herd ran off, He waited a minute, and then left.

Thinking that was that, I kept on down the trail, taking the loop North. And there they were again – on the trail, the whole herd staring at me. The big guy out front challenging me. I kept on walking and they slowly faded into the woods as I continued on the trail.

A little ways down the trail I heard a noise behind me, and there they were again. This time they were single file, big guy in the lead, following me, in the snowshoe track path. Well, I guess if you have to have stalkers, a whole herd of them, they might as well be deer. But the big guy was Big, and it was all just a bit too much for me.

I understand they were probably hungry, probably had been fed by people before, and undoubtedly, walking in the track was easier on their spindly little legs than taking on the 12 powder, still, whenever I look up at that hill, I know they are there, and I know they are watching.