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“It’s just personal stuff,” I replied, as I shook my head. “You don’t need to worry about it—”
I went quiet as I spotted something moving out of the corner of my eye.
“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” I whisper-screamed, moving closer to Damon, not stopping until I was pressed into his side. “I think we’ve got company.”
“You’re right. We do.” Damon flashed a warm smile, as he reached for my hand. A few seconds later he was pulling me toward a large group of trees, crouching us down behind them. We’d been hiking at an incline for the last half hour, which meant we were now at a sloping angle, the ground beside us one large hill.
“Is this what you’re supposed to do? To avoid a bear attack?” I whispered again.
Damon casually shook his head. “There are no bears out right now.”
“How do you know that?”
“It’s less about what I know,” he replied. “And more about what the deer know.”
“The deer?”
Damon nodded toward the clearing in front of us. My eyes followed along with his nod…
And then, my heart stopped right in my chest.
There were two deer in the clearing, a mom, and her baby. The mom bent down to graze and the baby matched her movements, a few seconds later both of them grazing in time with each other. A part of me wanted to move even closer to them, to offer them soft pets on top of their furry heads. I knew it was a bad idea, though, and would’ve probably led to me getting bitten pretty badly, so I decided to keep my hands to myself.
“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” I murmured. “Oh, my God. This is…”
“Wondrous?”
“Wondrous.” I nodded along with my words. “Do the deer usually come out like this?”
“They usually come out during dusk and dawn,” he answered. “But I think they also come out whenever there’s an opportunity for safety.”
“Which means the bear is far away?”
“Which means the bear is far away.” Damon lightly chuckled.
The mama deer then put her head up, like something had caught her attention. For a moment, she went completely still. A few tense seconds later, though, and she began to calmly head off in the opposite direction, her baby following close behind her.
“Oof. Sorry, Damon. Looks like they’re not big fans of your laugh,” I joked.
“Ha. Ha. Very funny.” Damon playfully rolled his eyes before a serious look crossed his expression. “It is beautiful, though. Getting to see moments like that. It’s one of the reasons I fell in love with Roanoke.”
“Getting to see cute deer whenever you want? Because yeah, that’s a pretty sweet deal.”
“Getting to see nature, as she really is,” he continued. “I don’t know how to put it into words sometimes, the sheer weight of everything. It’s majestic but it’s also just…”
Damon stopped and started, clearly searching for his words. “When I’m out here… it’s indescribable. The connection we’re supposed to have with nature… you can’t deny it when it’s just you and her. It sparks something inside you, something undeniable in your blood, in your lungs. I think we blunt it with technology, staring at screens, spending so much time away from the ground, away from the Earth. And we think that’s natural, being like that. But we have the whole thing so wrong. And then, we wonder why we can feel so wrong, too.”
Damon took in a breath, before he finished with his thoughts. “I just think there’s a reason that going for a walk, even if it’s just for a few minutes, makes so many people feel better. There’s something therapeutic about reconnecting with who we’re supposed to be, at least on this level.”
“Wow, Damon. That was…”
“Pretentious?”
“No. Poetic.” I offered him a small smile. “Have you ever written that down before? How do you feel about being out in nature?”
“Me? No way.” Damon let out a laugh. “You’re the writer, Sam. Not me.”
“I bet if you did, a lot of people would resonate with it,” I continued, with an encouraging shrug. “Besides, the only thing that makes me a writer is that I write. And anyone could do that. I think a lot of people just aren’t courageous enough to start.”
