Close encounters of the deer kind

Last week, I was taking advantage of the warm weather to get some exercise after work, by leaving my car at work and walking downtown to do an errand. Even though it was almost 8 pm and dark when I left, I enjoyed the warm breeze and the enchanted feeling of having 70-degree weather in March, in Michigan! People were out walking all over the place and there was a feeling of anticipation in the air.

Walking back from my errand, I had left the Kerrytown area and was crossing Division Street to walk over the Broadway Bridge. For some reason, I started thinking about when I used to park my car in the commuter lot the winter before this one, and hoof it back to my car thru the snow, while bundled up in long down coat (a relic from a ski trip to upper Canada in the 1990s).

My walk to the lot would take me through part of north campus and, when I left at the right time (6-ish), I would sometimes come upon a small herd of deer! They would be standing a few dozen yards from the path I was on, in a small grassy valley behind some classroom buildings. It was not an uninhabited area, to say the least. I was always amazed at the deer getting so close to us humans. I would freeze and just watch them in appreciation. Then either they would start to walk away or I would. If I was the one who walked first, I would gingerly step, s-l-o-w-l-y up the path so as not to startle them. I've heard stories of startled deer charging at people or out into the road in a frenzied and misguided attempt to get away.

I don't know why I was thinking of that -- I hadn't thought about that in a long time. After that winter, I had learned that I could park on the street at work and not get a ticket for staying longer than 3 hours, so I stopped parking at the commuter lot.

As I got to the top of the bridge, there was a bicyclist poised with her bike on the sidewalk. Just standing there looking at something. I started to pass her and gave her a polite nod, then I looked to my other side and saw why she was stopped on the bridge. She was watching -- two deer! They were on the grass a few dozen yards from us!

Now I understood why I had just thought about the deer on north campus. It was my "intuition" -- or spirit guides -- giving me a heads up about what was about to come!

So I stopped and watched them for awhile with the bicyclist. Other people walked by us on the sidewalk and never noticed. Cars whizzed by on the road behind us, but the deer didn't seem to be bothered by that at all.

I hadn't been so near to deer since walking at north campus. These were two young ones, so I asked the bicyclist if she had seen any older, deer parents. Our talking made them nervous, and the deer started to back away, so we decided to leave, "to give them peace."

Years ago, while driving with my former boyfriend in the countryside at night, I mentioned that I had just thought about looking out for deer. About a minute later, one ran across the road in front of our van, but my BF was prepared because we had just been talking about this, so he braked in time. It pays to listen to your inner guide, your intuition!