Noises in the dark
When I was eleven, I used to go camping by myself at the back my parent's 50 acres.
One day I set up my tent and then walked back to the house. I wanted to talk to Sara, a cousin, but couldn't do so until late. She was working, I believe.
Also, I had brought my dog Sable back with me when I set up the tent and had to bring her back to the house for the night. I didn't trust that she'd not freak out and wreck the tent through the night and I'd be damned before I'd have made her sleep outside.
As a camp counselor years later, I'd tell my kids that I was sung to sleep by coyotes when I grew up. The kids would laugh. Until they realized I was serious. The coyotes would yip and yowl in the fields by my house most nights. They were why I wasn't going to make her sleep outside.
It was dusk by the time I went back. I wasn't concerned. I had a flashlight and the tent was a mere hundred yards into the forest.
I reached the edge of the bush and ventured in, the feeble light from the flash illuminating barely a few feet ahead of me. The bush was far darker than I expected.
You see, it gets dark in the bush much faster than it does in the open.
The only path to follow was an old game trail that was plainly visible in the daytime and near invisible by the light of a flash. It didn't take long to lose it. And then I was lost.
I didn't panic yet though. I unfolded my locking blade and held it in one hand and the flash in the other. I must have walked around the bush in the dark for nearly a half hour. And didn't find the tent.
To make matters worse, I had been in the bush long enough that the animals had started making noises again. The normal noises of a forest at night, but made twice as loud by the adrenalin pumping through me.
That's about when I started to panic.
Really freaking, I whipped the light around from one noise to another, only seeing the light bouncing off of the eyes of the nocturnal animals all around me, worrying that the light was going to draw something to me that I didn't want.
So I turned out the flashlight.
Then it happened. What started as one of the many noises became louder, became clearer. Leaves crunched in a steady rhythm as something heavy ran through the bush toward me.
I remember shaking and holding my little three inch blade tightly in one hand and a huge branch I'd found in the other and thinking, "Shit."
Then I snarled and yelled and pounded the branch against the nearest tree.
Nothing happened. When I stopped my ruckus, the forest was dead silent.
With the flash turned off my eyes adapted to the dark and I could make out where the horizon was lighter, indicating which direction I should go to get out of the bush. So I took it and left.
I stood at the edge of the field for a moment looking towards the house that I couldn't see. Orienting myself. Then plunged back into the bush with the flash still in my pocket and found the tent in five minutes.
One day I set up my tent and then walked back to the house. I wanted to talk to Sara, a cousin, but couldn't do so until late. She was working, I believe.
Also, I had brought my dog Sable back with me when I set up the tent and had to bring her back to the house for the night. I didn't trust that she'd not freak out and wreck the tent through the night and I'd be damned before I'd have made her sleep outside.
As a camp counselor years later, I'd tell my kids that I was sung to sleep by coyotes when I grew up. The kids would laugh. Until they realized I was serious. The coyotes would yip and yowl in the fields by my house most nights. They were why I wasn't going to make her sleep outside.
It was dusk by the time I went back. I wasn't concerned. I had a flashlight and the tent was a mere hundred yards into the forest.
I reached the edge of the bush and ventured in, the feeble light from the flash illuminating barely a few feet ahead of me. The bush was far darker than I expected.
You see, it gets dark in the bush much faster than it does in the open.
The only path to follow was an old game trail that was plainly visible in the daytime and near invisible by the light of a flash. It didn't take long to lose it. And then I was lost.
I didn't panic yet though. I unfolded my locking blade and held it in one hand and the flash in the other. I must have walked around the bush in the dark for nearly a half hour. And didn't find the tent.
To make matters worse, I had been in the bush long enough that the animals had started making noises again. The normal noises of a forest at night, but made twice as loud by the adrenalin pumping through me.
That's about when I started to panic.
Really freaking, I whipped the light around from one noise to another, only seeing the light bouncing off of the eyes of the nocturnal animals all around me, worrying that the light was going to draw something to me that I didn't want.
So I turned out the flashlight.
Then it happened. What started as one of the many noises became louder, became clearer. Leaves crunched in a steady rhythm as something heavy ran through the bush toward me.
I remember shaking and holding my little three inch blade tightly in one hand and a huge branch I'd found in the other and thinking, "Shit."
Then I snarled and yelled and pounded the branch against the nearest tree.
Nothing happened. When I stopped my ruckus, the forest was dead silent.
With the flash turned off my eyes adapted to the dark and I could make out where the horizon was lighter, indicating which direction I should go to get out of the bush. So I took it and left.
I stood at the edge of the field for a moment looking towards the house that I couldn't see. Orienting myself. Then plunged back into the bush with the flash still in my pocket and found the tent in five minutes.
