The sounds of innocence
Peals of laughter, squeals of joy and young voices shouting in the distance. The words couldn't be distinguished, but they were cried out in frolic and play. The sounds came on the soft breeze from a nearby house. It was the sound of pure innocence. I've heard it before. Many times.
I had parked my truck on the woodland road and walked the 300 yards through the piney woods to my stand. After climbing up to the seat, pulling up my gun and getting situated, I checked the wind and surveyed my surroundings.
Sitting in this ladder stand with my back against a big pine tree, I was overlooking the edge of a shady hardwood swamp. The stand is deep in the woods on a large mound that rises 20 feet above the surrounding land. There are deer paths that run along the length of the mound and paths that cross over one end. It is a beautiful place, and I could sit there for hours, just looking at the woods.
It was a hot afternoon, and beads of sweat formed on my forehead and rolled down my face into my eyes and the corners of my mouth. I was trying to sit still but had to constantly wipe the sweat from my face. There wasn't enough breeze to offer any relief, and my patience was being tested.
When the sounds of children playing at a nearby house came floating on the breeze, it took me back to a different time. I remembered an afternoon years ago on a hillside halfway around the world. There was a small village below, in the valley. The sounds of children playing floated up to my lonely post. It made me think about my own little ones back home. It is a universal sound, no matter the nationality or language. It sounds the same. I was glad to hear it.
The sounds from the house drifted away now, and I noticed the birds calling in the canopy. Squirrels chattered in the maze of limbs, and crows called at a distance in the lonely sky. I could even hear a rustle in the leaves that spiraled down to the forest floor. These too are sounds of innocence. I sat in the still woods most of the afternoon, looking and listening. The bird calls diminished as the shadows crept into the woodlands around me. Silence eventually reigned.
A soft swoosh overhead caught my attention, and I looked up into the canopy. A very large owl landed in a pine right in front of me. It was a great horned owl with yellow eyes that seemed to glow in the soft evening light. After considering me for a few moments, he pitched out of the pine and flew through the big timber on silent wings.
It was not dark yet, but I was ready to get down and head toward home. I had not seen my intended quarry, but I had thoroughly enjoyed the afternoon, in spite of the heat. The children's laughter, the bird calls, the owl and the evening's piercing silence at dusk were on my mind as I walked the dim road back to my waiting truck. The roads back home seemed lonely and almost deserted, but the radio in my truck chased away the silence.
Approaching my house, the headlights revealed something in my front yard. I flipped on the high beams and was amused to see three deer in my yard. They scampered across the road into a big open field. I smiled, then considered the possibility that my laughter might have also been the sound of my own innocence.
Reach Dan Geddings at cdgeddings@gmail.com.