Deer Spotting

By James L. Davis

The headlights of my car caught the deer just as it was starting to cross the road.  The light of the day was only just fading from the sky as the deer looked at me, startled, it was a beautiful sight to behold.  I brought the car to a stop and waited as the four point buck cautiously started across the road.

My eyes followed the buck as it crossed and its frightened eyes continued to watch me as it came to the other side of the road.  And then, with one glance back at me, still staring at it intently, the buck shook its great antlered head and walked over to my car.

“What you lookin’ at fella?”  The buck stood in front of my door and tapped on my window with an antler until I finally rolled it down.  “I said what are you looking at?”

Not used to being addressed in such a fashion by woodland creatures, I was a little taken aback.  “What do you mean?”

“I mean every year about this time everywhere I turn there’s one of you humans gawking at me.  It gives me the creeps.  I try and cross a field and there you are, staring at me through your binoculars.  I come up from the creek and you just about run off the road trying to get a look at me.  So what?  Do I have something on my face for crying out loud?  What is it about me that you keep staring at?”

My eyes had been drawn inexorably toward the buck’s impressive rack, so it was difficult to pay attention.

“Hey buddy.  Down here, you’re staring again.  I asked you a question.”

“Oh, yeah.  Well, I’m not a hunter but I think people are looking at your, well, they’re looking at your…”

The buck poked his nose through the window of my car.  “Spit it out already.”

“Your rack.  They’re staring at your impressive rack,” I blurted out, ashamed because I could not help staring and hoping that the deer wasn't hostile.  He seemed to have some anger issues.  Had I known that deer had anger issues I would not have stopped to let this deer pass. 

“Well, that’s just sick.”  The deer paced around my car for a moment or two and then returned to my window.  I tried not to look at his antlers, but it was difficult.  “Why do you people want to stare at my rack?”

“Well, I think a lot hunters would like to have your rack.”

“No doubt, but my rack would look funny on one of you humans.”

“No, I don’t mean to wear, just to have, kinda like a trophy.”

The deer looked at me incredulously, which up until that point in time I was not aware that a deer could do.  

“You people want my rack as a trophy?”

“Well, not all people, just some people.  Hunters.”

“Rack hunters?”

“Sorta,” I said, not particularly comfortable with where this conversation was heading.

“Well just tell them to stop staring at me.  When I shed my antlers they can have them for crying out loud.  They can fight over them for all I care.”

“I don’t think you completely understand.”

“What’s not to understand?”  The buck was sitting on the hood of my car now, swinging his legs restlessly.

“The hunters, well, they don’t just want your antlers for a trophy.  They want your entire head.”

The deer laughed and I was shocked to discover that when deer laugh they sound exactly like David Letterman. “Well, that’s just crazy.  If they were to take my head as a trophy then they would have to…” The light of realization finally clicked on in the buck’s dull brown eyes.  “That’s…that’s inhuman!”

“Well, no, actually it’s pretty human.”

“They want to take my head?”

“And hang it on the wall, yes.”

“Why would they want to do such a thing?”

“It’s a sport.”

“Yeah, well so is football.  Do they hang the head of the opposing team’s quarterback on the wall?”

“No.  But maybe it’s never been suggested before.  It might make for a more exciting season.”

The buck jumped off my car hood and glared at me, shaking his head menacingly.  “You tell those sick voyeurs that they’ll get this rack over my dead body.”

“I think that’s the idea.”

But the buck didn't hear me.  He had started back across the road and my eyes drifted once again to his rack.

“Watch your eyes!” He called out as he slipped out of sight.

When Deer Seek Asylum

When Deer Seek Asylum

By James L. Davis

I was awakened in the middle of the night.

“Stay down. They might be watching.”

“What’s wrong?” I asked, rubbing the sleep from my eyes. 

“They’re trying to kill me.”

I’m not used to being awakened in the middle of the night, except by my wife’s dog, who will on occasion yawn to tell me she wants to go outside.   Not that she needs to go outside; she just wants to go out in the middle of the night to have a look around. 

Not used to being awakened by a strange voice in the middle of the night, I asked the obvious: “Who are ‘They’?”

“I don’t know,” my late-night intruder responded. “But there’s thousands of them, all dressed in orange.”

I reached out and turned on the night stand light and my wife mumbled incoherently and threw the blankets over her head.  I wished she hadn't because I wasn't quite prepared to deal with what was in our bedroom. There was a deer standing at the end of our bed, looking rather distressed.

“You’re a deer,” I said, stating the obvious.

“I’m a Buck,” my intruder informed me.

“Well, why are you in my bedroom?” I asked.

“Because they’re trying to kill me!” The deer went to my elliptical and started to work out.  I was wondering who kept changing the level setting. “I don’t know who they are. I don’t know what I’ve done. But they’re out to kill me.”

I tried again to rub the sleep from my eyes. “Well, you’re a deer.”

“The dog said you were quick.”

“You talk to the dog?”

“Sometimes she comes out at night and we chat.”

“That explains a lot.  What I meant was you are a deer and it is Deer Season.”

“Meaning?” The deer was up to level nine on the elliptical and still not breathing hard. That explains why they can jump so well.

“Meaning that the people in orange are hunters and they’re trying to kill you for a reason.”

“What reason? I don’t even know who they are.”

“Well, either to eat you or to cut your head off and put it on their wall.”

The buck climbed off the elliptical.  “You’re kidding, right?

“Afraid not,” I said.

“Are you a hunter?”

“Nope.” I said. “I don’t care for the taste of deer meat.”

“So now you’re saying I taste bad.”

“I didn't say you tasted bad. I didn't realize deer were so hostile.”

“Hostile!” The deer raised his voice, making my wife mumble and bury herself deeper within the covers. “Let me tell you about hostile. I’m getting ready for the rut, feeling pretty good about myself, wanting to strut around a little, and then all of a sudden BAM! People I don’t even know are shooting at me. Wouldn't you be hostile?”

“Suppose so. But could you keep it down, you’ll wake my wife and the kids.”

“I’m a deer.” The deer pranced to my side of the bed “They won’t understand me.”

“I do,” I said.

“Yes. But you’re not normal.”

“So I've been told. What do you want from me anyway?”

“Sanctuary.”

“Sorry, all my neighbors are hunters and I don’t want them storming through the house looking for you. You can take my orange hat and vest if you want, maybe they’ll think you’re a hunter yourself.”

“Fat chance. I've got a rack to die for.”

“Interesting choice of words,” I said. “Why’d you come to me in the first place?”

“Your dog said you might be able to help me.”

“ I've got to do something about that dog.”

The deer was pacing now and I could see he was becoming quite agitated again. “You’re not going to remember any of this when you wake up, are you?”

“I sincerely hope not,” I said.

The buck turned and bounced out of my room, down the hall and out the door and I was able to get back to sleep.

The next morning I was quite convinced that I either needed to cut back on my caffeine intake or go immediately into therapy. But then I noticed that my safety hat and vest were missing. There were deer droppings on my welcome mat as well and to top it off what I had always thought was a yawn from my wife’s dog now seemed suspiciously like a laugh.

The Dentist Will See You Now

By James L. Davis

When I was a baby and my first baby tooth finally protruded from my baby gums it already had a baby cavity.   For this reason I have logged more hours in a dentist chair than the average person and for that reason I have had more than my fair share of time to ponder the joys that can only be experienced when you have several people put their hands in your mouth at the same time and ask you about the weather.

I don’t mind telling you and I’m fairly sure that my dentist won’t be offended when I say that I am not comfortable sitting in a dentist chair.  I never have been and I’m fairly confident that I never will be. 

I say that knowing full well that I have fallen asleep in a dentist chair, which may lead you to believe that I was very comfortable, but if that is what you believe you are mistaken.  I can fall asleep virtually anywhere at any time.  It’s a gift.  Some people have amazing talents.  They can sing or dance or run or compute numbers in their head or have entire conversations without using the word “like.”  I can’t do any of those things, but I can, like, fall asleep at a moment’s notice.  And the more stressed I am, the easier it is for me to sleep.  Which means lately I can sleep virtually 24 hours a day.  In a couple of weeks I figure I’ll be in a coma.

So, despite the fact that I have snored in a dentist chair, I still am not comfortable in a dentist chair and there are numerous reasons why, not the least of which is I do not like pain.  I also do not like to have other people’s hands in my mouth.  I don’t even particularly like having my own hand in my mouth, although I am apparently ok with having my foot in my mouth.  I don’t like the sound the drill makes as it echoes through my skull and I don’t like to see smoke coming out of my mouth.  For that reason I do not keep my eyes open when I sit in the dentist chair.  I clinch them shut, open wide and hope the dentist or his assistant will let me know when it is all over and I can go home. 

But the things that I don’t like pale in comparison to the things I worry about in a dentist chair.  I worry about a wide variety of things while sitting in a dentist chair.  I worry because the dentist and his army of assistants are not only looking into my mouth, they are looking up my nose and I am not fond of people looking up my nose.  It’s not a phobia or anything; I just prefer not to have people looking into my nostrils.  So, I guess it’s fair to say that if you are in the body piercing business you will never have to worry about me asking you to put a piercing through my nose, because I never will.  I also worry that I might sneeze while all of those hands are in my mouth, so I spend a whole lot of time wrinkling my nose to avoid sneezing, which draws attention to my nose and fuels my worry over people looking up my nose.

But the number one thing I worry about the most while sitting in the dentist chair is I worry that I will become engulfed in a fit of laughter and the dentist will drill through my cheek.  This is not because I am on laughing gas, because I haven’t used laughing gas since I was a boy.  I had to stop using laughing gas at the dentist because the dentist had too difficult a time getting any work done on my mouth.  Apparently, under the influence of laughing gas I am prone to sing the hits of Aretha Franklin, which I find odd because when I am not under the influence of laughing gas I cannot think of a single Aretha Franklin song, let alone sing one.

No, the reason I worry about breaking into hysterics is completely and totally the fault of Bill Cosby.  I grew up listening to Bill Cosby and I believe him to be among the greatest comedians that there ever was and ever will be.  The problem is that Bill Cosby has devoted an entire monologue on his experience going to the dentist.  It is one of the funniest things I have ever heard.

The problem with that is from the moment I sit down in the dentist chair to the moment I try and take my first sip of anything upon leaving the dentist chair and have it spill down my shirt I am reminded of Bill Cosby’s monologue and I fight a laughing fit.

So, while my dentist impales my mouth with a needle my eyes well with tears less with pain and more because I am fighting the urge to laugh because I do not want him to break the needle off in my gum. That may make me laugh more.  I try not to laugh when I am engaged in conversation while my mouth is full of somebody else’s hands.  I try not to laugh when my lips are numb and I am drooling across my chin.  I just close my eyes and try not to think about Bill Cosby.

At that point I usually fall asleep and have nightmares of someone looking up my nose. (Published in Family News.com)

Don’t Steal their Noses

By James L. Davis

     You have to be careful what you teach your children because it might come back to haunt you in the strangest of places, like the aisles of the local Wal-Mart for instance.

     In the case of my oldest daughter, she taught her children to be thieves and the end result was mayhem in the cereal aisle.  Not just any kind of thieves mind you, no, she taught her children to be nose thieves and mouth thieves.

     Although I don’t entirely know why, my daughter started trying to convince her children at an early age that she could remove their noses from their face.  She would do so by giving their nose a soft pinch and then showing them how their nose was now held between her forefinger and middle finger.  She would pinch their nose and then tell them “got your nose” and show them what they thought was their nose but was in fact her thumb impersonating their nose.

     It was a cute trick and the kids laughed whenever their mom stole their nose because she would always give it back.  But that is where mothers are different from children.  Because mothers will use a trick to delight their children and children will use a trick to terrorize their sibling, which is what the “Steal Your Nose Trick” mutated into.

     If you could steal a person’s nose, then certainly you could also steal their mouth and if you could steal their mouth, then surely you could steal their entire head, which is what my 4-year-old and 2-year-old grandsons decided to do whenever they had the opportunity, they would steal each other’s body parts.

     Now sibling body part theft is all well and good when it is done in the relative calm of your own home because you can, for the most part, yell at your children to give back his brother’s head and be done with it.  But when you are in the cereal aisle of the local Wal-Mart ordering your children to put your brother’s nose back on his face will have a tendency to alarm other shoppers.

     So it was that when my 2-year-old grandson suddenly reached up and tweaked his big brother’s mouth he began to cry the Wal-Mart cry, which is just like a normal cry only several decibels higher.

     “What’s wrong with you?”  My daughter asked her wailing son.

     “Ashtun stole my mouth.”  My 4-year-old grandson, Gavin, told his mother.

     At this point my daughter did something that was doomed to failure even before she began.  She attempted to talk reasonably to a 4 year old boy crying the Wal-Mart cry.

     “If Ashtun stole your mouth, how are you talking?”  She asked.

     Gavin paused to consider the complexities of her question and finally came up with a solution.

     “With my spit!” He said and began to cry all the louder because his little brother seemed on the verge of throwing his mouth down the aisle.

     It didn't take much longer, perhaps two confused stares by passersby, for my daughter to do away with the reasoning approach.

     “Ashtun, you give back your brother’s mouth right now.”

     Ashtun slapped his brother’s mouth back into place and while leaning close enough to slap his brother’s mouth back into place Gavin reached up and stole his little brother’s nose…and promptly ate it.

     And great weeping and wailing in the Wal-Mart cry echoed down the canyons of cereal.

     Furious and still crying that his big brother had stolen and eaten his hose, Ashtun stole back his brother’s mouth and tossed it on the floor and then stole his nose and right ear and threw it over the cereal aisle and Gavin again began to scream as he stole Ashtun’s mouth and stuffed it inside his shirt.

     My daughter began to laugh at this time she reports but I wonder exactly what kind of laugh was it?  Was it the hee hee laugh of one amused at the antics of your children or was it the Jack Nicholson haa haaa haaa heee heee heee that made people wonder about your sanity and if you might have an ax nearby they should be concerned about.  My daughter, for her part isn't telling but I have noticed a twitch in her eye that wasn't there a couple of children ago.

     The boys’ father, having heard the Wal-Mart cries of his children from the other side of the store, found his family and after having explained to him what the problem was, carefully went about the process of picking up his children’s body parts scattered across the floor of the store.  He returned Gavin and Ashtun’s nose, mouth and ear and the boys were quiet and relatively happy.

     For about 10 seconds, when they both started to cry again.

     “Now what?” My daughter asked.

     “You gave me Ashtun’s mouth and nose,” Gavin wailed.

     At this point is where I think my daughter’s eye twitch became more pronounced.  (Published in Deseret News Online and Family News.com)

The Dog is Cute and Other Lies

by James L. Davis

     We have an ugly dog at our house.  At one time we had an UGLY dog at our house and when I say ugly I mean ugly in all capital letters, maybe with a few exclamation marks thrown in for good measure.  But now she is just ugly.  Her name is Sadie.

     For most of my family Sadie has spanned the known realm of Ugly and emerged in the realm of Cute, which is what I guess happens when you are ugly enough, you become cute.  But for me Sadie is still ugly, but in an endearing way.

     Sadie is a 15-year-old pug and for those wondering if pugs grow cuter as they grow older, the answer is no, they do not.  Ugly dogs I believe compensate for their ugliness by having great personalities and that is one reason why I have grown to love Sadie, because she has a truly great personality.

     I didn’t always think so.  Sadie is my wife’s dog and when my wife and I were dating I was convinced that there was something wrong with my wife because she continually referred to Sadie as cute.  I didn’t argue with my wife at the time because she was not yet my wife and I wanted to continue dating her, so I let her live in her little fantasy world, believing that Sadie was cute.

     The first time I met Sadie was when my future wife invited me over to dinner for the very first time.  My future wife went to the kitchen to finish dinner and she told me to have a seat on the couch, which I did, trying to impress her with my obedience.  While I sat on the couch I tried to figure out how to sit on a couch in a manly, ruggedly handsome way.  It should be noted that it is impossible to sit in a ruggedly handsome way on a couch.  To sit in a ruggedly handsome way you must sit on a chair, preferably a wooden chair with splinters.  But since there was no wooden chair with splinters in the room I tried to sit on the couch in as manly a fashion as is possible, which meant leaning forward with my hands clasped in front of me and a deep, contemplative look on my face.  My future son soon walked in the room and asked me if I needed to go to the restroom, so I stopped trying to look contemplative and settled for a blank stare.

About this time Sadie waddled over to where I was sitting, sniffed my leg once and plopped down on top of my feet to take a little nap.  I reached down to give her a pet and my hand became lost in the folds of her skin.  Sadie looked up at me with two huge goldfish eyes, snorted much like a pig, only louder, and smiled at me, which created more folds of skin all the way down her body for my hand to become lost within.  I stopped petting Sadie, sat back on the couch and Sadie settled in for her nap.

     About five minutes into her nap Sadie began to snore.  It was a long, drawn out snore that drowned out the television and was in the melody of Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.  I tried to hum along, but couldn’t keep rhythm.

     At this point I began to wonder exactly what my future wife saw in pugs that made her want to not only own one, but allow one to live in her house.  And that was when the smell first hit me.  Although I lived most of my youth in the city, I have spent my share of time on the farm and I am used to animal smells.  This was worse than any of the smells I had smelled before.  My dad used to take care of maintenance for a small town and I helped him with a lot of sewer line repairs.  This was worse than those smells as well.  About the time the first wave of gaseousness passed Sadie let loose with another and the thing that immediately came to my mind was that there are quite a few jokes about someone trying to pass his own gas off on the family dog.  I realized with horror that I was now living the punch line to one of those jokes.

     About that time my future wife came into the room, waved her arms in the air and laughed.  “Sorry,” she said.  “Sadie has gas.”  She took the old girl by the collar and led her out of the room, saying “isn’t she cute?” to me as she went and I said why of course she is because I wanted to date my future wife again and was therefore prepared to lie about her dog if I had to.

     After almost five years of marriage I no longer feel that Sadie is the most hideous creature that ever lived.  In fact, pugs have become my favorite breed of dog, which has brought on new worries.  They say that dog owners start to resemble their pets, or vice versa, which has resulted in some careful self-inspection.  For instance, I check the mirror more often to see how many folds of skin develop across my face and down my body when I smile and I carry Gas-X with me at all times.  Just in case. (Published on Deseret News Online)