The Gift of Death

A second story of wolves & dogs from a few years back

Dedicated to Richard Wagamese

We went away for the month of February and a friend, Lara, stayed at our place, keeping the animals fed and the house and greenhouse warm. While she was here, out on a snowshoe walk in the back woods, she came upon a deer kill. Now you may have seen things like this on TV, or seen real animals butchered, or torn up pretty bad at the side of the road, but when you come across a fresh wolf kill in real life out in the bush, it’s something of an initiation.

Suddenly our bubble of safety, entitlement, and technology, pops and we are full-on looking into the face of reality. Alone, way back in the bush, with no house or even fence to hide behind, we know in a primal way that we are in the presence of a large predator, or many, that just tore apart a warm blooded animal (about our size). If the parts of the body are still there or not, you will see a large blood red pit, still pulsing with life in the white snow that’s been melted down to the ground. For a second, it looks out of place, like a giant water ballon of blood was dropped from somewhere above the forest canopy. From the zero point of the kill and feast, the blood spreads out fading in every direction, until about ten feet from the epicentre paw prints trail off from light pink to white again. Generally at this point after a few minutes of dumb struck awe, it occurs to you that maybe you’re the one that’s out of place, and should go. And Lara did.

The truth is, that it’s extremely rare for wolves or coyotes to attack a human. But in moments like this, statistical facts about such things seem rather flimsy, like the paper they’re written on. Whereas our myths and stories about these beings rise up and loom large. We have an illusion that we know these animals from nature documentaries, but the truth is when you really get to know these animals up close in reality, they more resemble by far the awesome mythical changelings our ancestors spoke of in stories, than they do the biologist’s behavioural interpretations.

Yesterday, the soft snow refroze hard which enables one to walk on top without snowshoes. So I thought I would head out and see if I could find the kill site and make some offerings, and maybe have a look around for the toes, which make excellent rattles. (the original jingle dancers in the Anishinaabe tradition, who danced to heal people, used hundreds of deer toes sewn onto a deer skin dress so it would shake like a heavy rain when they danced). I hadn’t really walked in the back for a month or so, which is a long time for me, so I was going slow, looking at everything and telling the land about the trip down south we were just back from. At the only high point on the last field before the unbroken forest, where you can see out over the wetland a couple hundred feet away, I look over and I see my dog May running full speed in the opposite direction to where Sophie and I (my other dog) were walking. Sometimes we call May ‘Mayhem’ because while she is a looker, and has a lovely disposition she is a bit of a nit wit. This isn’t a judgement, it’s a fact, and we love her just the same, like one might a family member that’s not right full on the mark. Anyway, as I watch her tear along the wetland shoreline, I’m thinking “what’s she up to now”, imagining she’s chasing deer or something. Then I see another bigger dog running along with her. And it actually looks like they’re having fun, so I think ‘someone else’s dog is out here in the bush’. Then I see another, and another, and my brain fully registers what going on. Wolves! Running full-out, chasing, gaining and circling in on, my super fast dog!

I had to do something! I have a really loud piercing whistle, and so I really shoot that out to them to let them know I’m here and to back-off. It did throw them off for a split second, but because I was downwind (and it was windy), they didn’t register where it came from and didn’t stop the chase. The whistle bought May a few feet, and also changed her direction. To right towards me, at full speed. The wolves changed their vector accordingly, also toward me, to cut off her path. So now she and four other large wolves are forty feet away and bearing down on me like a train. I didn’t have gloves and also have the ability to clap really loud, so I clapped four times, like my life depended on it. And one by one the wolves looked up, saw me and turn casually off the chase, back toward the direction they came from. Back to the kill site.

As it turns out those wolves fully woke up two of us. Lara, and then me a week later.

The wolves had probably been napping near by, because it was 2pm and sunny. May, oblivious to the careful boundaries our other dog Sophie had negotiated with the wolves over the years, had blundered into their territory. And maybe because she is currently an un-neutered female, they were having a run with her to check her out. That’s what I told myself. But then coincidentally that night we caught about five minutes of “the nature of things” on CBC, which happened to be about wolves and saw 3 or 4 wolves run down, catch and kill another wolf from another pack. Yikes.

Fully realizing our true vulnerability and knowing that we have to act, and rely on our skills to save ourselves is a rare gift these days. When I lived in the bush by myself many years ago that used to be a way of life, as it was for our ancestors. And these experiences bring us both humility and confidence. While the threats to our existence seem less poignant the truth is we all do need to act now and bring our full abilities to bare, just like when we lived in the wilds. This experience reminded me of a short piece called “Spirit Place” by Richard Wagamese, in his book “One Story, One Song”. Richard was a humorous, wise and humble teacher and one of Canada’s most important writers.

Here’s to you Richard, thank you for your gifts. I know you’re feeling your ancestors embrace, and the sadness and tears we’re shedding on this side are matched by the joy and tears of your reunion on the other side.