81 A Deer, My Dear

February 2010

Driving around Austin I have seen oppossum, skunks, armadillo, and even a fox on the side of the road or darting across it.  I've seen red-tailed hawks in the sky, heard owls in the green belt and seen a heron in a South Austin pond.  This February I saw a white-tailed deer.

In some places around Austin there are so many deer in the wooded areas next to neighborhoods that they will enter people's yards and nibble their flowers and decorative plants.  That's why the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center and nurseries like The Natural Gardener will have "deer resistant" listed on labels of certain potted plants for sale.  (Those are the plants you want, by the way.  Plants missing the "deer resistant" label are prone to be stripped bare when food gets scarce in the green belt or woods if such places exist near your home.)  The nibbling of yard plants is what leads my husband to refer to deer as "long-legged rats."

Still, they're beautiful animals to me.

I was driving along a divided road with a 35 mph speed limit when a deer darted in front of my car.  That in itself isn't odd, but this was in a residential neighborhood rather than a two-lane country road so it really got my attention.  I'll guess that the deer was a doe because it didn't have any antlers.  Maybe it was fleeing coyotes.  I've heard them in the green belt from time to time.

The deer got lucky.  I was the only motorist in that part of the road at that moment, and I was able to slow down enough for it to pass in front of me unharmed.  It ran up to the fence between two houses.  I glanced at a confused-looking deer staring at the 6-foot tall wooden fence as I made the left turn.

The deer also turned left and ran through the various front yards, parallel to and slightly behind my car.  It must have crossed the road behind me because I suddenly noticed it on my right and a couple of houses ahead of me.  Once again the deer headed towards the 6-foot high wooden fence between two houses.

This time, however, the deer didn't stop at the fence.  Instead it jumped up and over the fence without missing a beat.

"Whoa!" I said out loud in my car, thoroughly impressed.  The power the deer used in its legs to make a jump like that awed me.  Wow!

Suddenly, I felt extraordinarily grateful to be alive, and to have been in the right place at the right time to witness that little explosion where nature met neighborhood.

I also wondered how long the deer would stay in that homeowner's back yard and whether it would be there long enough for anyone living in the house to see it.  Now that I think over the situation, I also wonder if the deer took time to nibble any back yard plants before it left.

It's now March 2010, a month that is about to slip into April.  I reached my 4-year anniversary as a survivor on March 3rd.  Hooray!  Four years and counting is an exciting statistic for me.  Later this week I'll get my annual mammogram again, and hopefully there will be nothing in that film to indicate I'm anything other than cancer free.  Our son turned four this month and I must admit that I already like his attitude as a 4-year-old better than the 3-year-old days.  It keeps getting better and better.  (I'm glossing over all the rough moments, of course, because I have forgotten them in the wake of this morning's smiles and hugs before work and school.)

Next - 82 My Time on Capitol Hill - April 2010
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