This morning I woke up and built a fire in my moms fireplace. It felt so good to relax with my coffee and book in front of the flames. There is a large window in the living room that looks out on the woods surrounding the house. Kim will sit for hours just watching for movement and life between the trees. As I drifted into the final chapter of my book, Kim wandered over and took her position at the window. An hour or so later glancing over as I closed my book I noticed Kim's silhouette outlined against the vivid whiteness of the frigid outdoors. Carefully and quietly I reached for the camera on the coffee table next to my outstretched sock feet. I framed the scene through the viewfinder and depressed the shutter, confident in the exposure and expectant that Kim would turn and vacate. The motor of the film winder hummed and drew the next exposure into the shutter window. Usually the noise is more than enough to disrupt Kim from whatever she is doing, but this time it had no effect on her. Jubilant I moved a few steps and framed up for another shot. The winder purred, still no movement. Another shot, nothing. Again, she sat in her own world...the outside world, fixated. I put the camera down and crawled on all fours across the carpet and pressed my nose against the cold glass right next to hers. Hot breath from boy and dog nostrils lightly fogged the window panes for a few seconds before its dissipation and return. As I looked out onto the crisp white snowy world of the Ohio wood, I wondered what was drawing so much of her attention. Turning I even asked her, she didn't turn to me, she didn't respond in the least, not even a blink. I stared into her eyes and watched her rigid body tensed in anticipation of something...or someone hidden from my view in the icy crackling forest. As I turned back to the window I suddenly saw something...a cautious and delicate hoof and leg slowly moved from behind an abandoned shed 50 yards from our window...then another hoof and leg...then a soft brown nose and eyes with a white streak along its head and back emerged, and finally a puffy white tail like a flame of cotton. Kim stopped breathing. As the mother grew confidant, she offered a flick of her head and as cautious as she entered, was joined by three fawn. Instantly I understood what had been entrancing Kim. I was surprised at how quiet she had remained, usually barking at anyone that comes near the house, yet this family of deer was allowed to move about so calmly. We watched them together, silent, noses still depressed side by side, fixated on the forest family's tentative movements. The Mothers head held high surveying the surrounding for signs of danger, relaying instinctive messages to the naive youths foraging the snowy ground beneath their hooves. As they slowly moved between the trees, disappearing and reappearing again, they stopped for a few moments underneath a faded black and orange "No Trespassing" sign, long before hastily stapled and forgotten to the side of a tree. I took that scene in for as long as it lasted, the idea of a man shrewdly hanging a sign on a tree, too greedy to let people enjoy the forest he "owned", met with a vision of natures existence and evolution of dealing with mans greed, the tentative, cautious lives of these animals, and the delicate balance of man and nature.....As I drifted into my thoughts I remembered how I found myself gazing upon this scene. I turned away from the window and looked at Kim. For the first time since I moved from the couch she broke her stare, looked at me concernedly for a few seconds, then turned back to the deer. With nothing more than a faint scoff of her voice, the mother deer's ear twitched and in one fluid movement the family bound back into the forest, disappearing between the trees and the light dust of snow and ice.
