Dave Mason - Let Us Love Again

Doey [DOH-ee] was a rather plump white-tailed deer [Odocoileus virginianus (Virgin for short, but not for long)] living some 450 kilometers due north of Cortes Island on the rugged but idyllic Nechako Plateau in Canada’s British Columbia.

She liked hiking along the cutbacks on the Nechako River, gazing at the river’s expanse and, of course, drinking its refreshing waters. What she didn’t know was that the river had changed after they diverted it somewhere downstream to make that reservoir. She personally had no use for the electricity generated there and even less use for the aluminum plant that it serviced.

Her best friend was an equally heavy-set caribou whom she’d known all her life. As with all kids, they made up nicknames for each other which then turned into terms of endeerment later in adult life.

When they were young, the caribou teased her by called her “Doughy” because she looked like she was carrying around enough dough to bake a dozen loaves of bread. She in turn called him “Moose” [Alces alces], the largest species in the deer family, although he was a reindeer [Rangifer tarandus]. It was his slender reindeer snout —which she, until her last breath, had found so attractive and which she, from the start, tried so desperately to deny— that gave rise to his nickname. Moose, as you know, have a wide droopy snout with huge nostrils.

While the name “Moose“ was just between the two of them, “Doughy” caught on within the herd. Fortunately, the bread metaphor was lost on the other calves so they called her “Doey”, as in “doe, a deer, a female deer”. It was at that time that Moose stopped calling Doey by name. In fact, he never referred to her while with others; that is love in the deer world.

The calves were not so lenient with the caribou. Being a good-natured reindeer, he endured their taunts including their calling him “Rudolph the red-nosed blockhead”. They swarmed around him like hyenas. Individually they were in awe of him, but, as a pack, they were merciless. Mobbing is not confined to birds and dolphins in the animal world.

Doey’s nemesis was a chubby slut nicknamed Elke. While the name itself has an air of nobility and kindness (as in “Adelaide”), Elke was none of that: she was ruthless and defiant. She became the leader of the pack through shear audacity, the putrid emanations from her oral cavity being not only a mixture of methane gas and ruminant odor but deadly barbs aimed at the very soul of her victims. The others clung to her like deer flies, each in fear of becoming her next target.

As irony would have it in the deer world, Elke herself was an Alces alces, “elk” being the European word for “moose”. Doey secretly called her “Whambi” because she [Elke] knocked you over the head with an insult at the mere drop of some feces, which alone is a known source of disease.

Romantic as she was, Doey often fantasized about being “Faline” in Felix Salten’s novel, with Moose as “Bambi”, her love interest; she even stole an occasional kiss from him.

I wish they’d stop teasing me. Okay, so I’m a little stocky at the short loins. I’m just big boned. And, when I find acorns and berries, I simply can’t stop. Is that a sin?

Moose was so sweet this morning. After another round of cheap shots from “the girls”, he sauntered up to me and whispered, “I’ve always been fawn of you”. That sure made my butt twitch. He’s more than just a swell guy. He’s a pillar of strength. A true friend.

Whambi had the girls pitch in for a “birthday present” for me. God, am I naïve! I should have seen it coming! In the box was a pair of over-sized, snap-on antlers. I was so humiliated.

Moose was being harassed today by a group of young white-tailed punks. They wanted to know what he was doing in “their” neck of the woods when reindeer are supposed to be up scavenging the Arctic tundra.

*Once again Doey intuitively perceived a now scientifically-proven reindeer trait: reindeer possess a three-gear cooling system! Here’s how it works:

When it starts getting too warm, the caribou can turn its breathing from, say, seven cycles per minute all the way up to 260 cycles per minute. By breathing through its nose, it can dehumidify the mucous membrane in its sinuses, thus sending cooled blood from the head back to the heart.

If the dehumidifier is not enough, it switches to panting like a dog, thereby using the multitude of blood vessels on its tongue to cool blood before sending it back to the heart. The reindeer can fine-tune this setting by regulating the blood flow in its tongue.

If that’s not enough, it can reroute the cooled blood to a web of veins surrounding its carotid arteries, thus cooling that blood on its way to the brain.

John Deere’s been making the rounds. We does [dohz] call him John Deere because he is quite a machine when he catches you alone in the forest. I’ve never seen it, but I’ve herd [heard] that he has quite a smirk on his snout when he’s thrusting.

Whambi was so mean today. I was trotting past the girls when she called out to me, “Hey, Doughy*! A Chinese druggist was looking for you.“ She laughed so hard at her own joke that she even shat a pile. Aha, soft clumps! Whambi’s been sneaking off to some green grass field or has been raiding farm crops, while the rest of us have been stuck here eating twigs and dry leaves. Pooping hard pellets is our life’s burden. Bitch.

So after laughing her tail off, she explained to her bewildered circle that powdered deer penis is widely available in Chinese pharmacies. I wasn’t even out of earshot before the whole clique guffawed. I think I’ll snap on those antlers and do some damage.

I wish I could climb up into one of those towers that those smelly two-leggers erected yesterday. Then I would be out of those bitches’ line of sight.

Moose has lost his antlers so I guess he is finished mating for this season. John Deere hasn’t lost his yet, and he is headed this way. I’d better close for now before