ELK

I’ve just finished a walk on A-1 Mountain, a big hill behind our cabin here in Northern Arizona. At the foot of the mountain, there’s a prairie of indigenous grass and that’s where the cabin is located. Behind it, you can see the hill and a forest of tall pines.
I climbed the hill slowly. It’s pretty steep and although I often hike in the desert where I easily climb the rocky hills, this northern one is more demanding. It’s because of the altitude; the cabin is at more than seven thousand feet above sea level.
Halfway up the slope, I see another cabin abandoned by its owners because of the coming winter climate. It’s only 200 yards from ours but I have never seen any sign of anyone living there: no car, no lights that shine through the cracks in the closed curtains.
Next door, there’s another cabin also abandoned as ours will be tomorrow when I go.
In the 80s when I called my parents on the phone I often heard them say, “There were ten elk in front of the house this morning.”

With regard to this, I always had bad luck and frankly I don’t think I ever saw a single elk They are summer houses and I’m here not only to avail myself of the beauty, solitude, and nature that this area of Arizona offers, but to prepare the house for the fall of winter.
You can’t easily live here during the winter. When there’s a storm, the roads get blocked by snow and it’s so cold that it’s difficult to heat the cabin. We have neighbors next door that live here all year. They have good heating and a four-wheel-drive pick-up truck. My truck isn’t a four-by-four.

I walked around the two little houses on the hill. I know that I am trespassing and I was startled at seeing something moving among the pines. It was an elk, a female walking very slowly on the hill. It was as big as a horse. It stopped and looked at me a minute before continuing on. Then it stopped again and looked at me once more. I followed it as it walked, stopped, and looked at me. I didn’t get close to it since I’m afraid of animals that are larger than I (and also a few that are a lot smaller). I took a few pictures.

In the 80s when I called my parents on the phone I often heard them say, “There were ten elk in front of the house this morning.”
With regard to this, I always had bad luck and frankly I don’t think I ever saw a single elk
back then. Now things have changed. In broad daylight I have very often seen lots of elk here. In fact, a while ago I saw a herd of more than two-hundred that crossed our field, the does with their fawns and the males with their huge antlers.
At night when I’m in the cabin reading, I hear a noise outside. It’s the sound of the hooves of these giant deer walking upon the soft ground of our field. The silent herd moves slowly on the border of the forest where the sound of their hoof-steps disappears.

Many times I have opened the back door and have directed a flashlight towards the elk. The light never illuminates the herd very well and it’s hard for me to see the dark forms of the animals through the gloom. However, I see quite plainly the orange eyes that shine in the light. They glow like coals.

The herd and the orange eyes move away slowly but there are always two or three pairs that don’t move at all. Those bright eyes observe me as the herd disappears into the woods. They’re protecting the others, and when the other animals of the herd have gone, the light from those two or three pairs of eyes fade and vanish in the darkness of the night.

Today on the hill I saw nuthatches and woodpeckers in the pines. I started walking over there and I came across the Carothers’ cabin. They were friends of my parents. I had forgotten that their cabin was so close to ours. There are still swings on the side of the house although the kids that I used to know must be at least thirty years old now. Perhaps the swings are for their kids. The memory of the get togethers we used to have there with the Carothers so long ago come to mind.

“How the years have blown by!” I said to myself. “Where could the years of the 80s have gone and, oh the nineties and holy cow the first ten years of the twenty-first century!”
These thoughts depressed me a little, but I started on my way back happy. I left the woods and saw the prairie and the towering San Francisco Peaks to the north whose yellow meadows and green forests seemed so close that I could almost reach out my hand and touch them.

According to the weather forecast, it was going to turn much colder and windier that day and indeed an icy wind had already begun to blow. The dry stalks of grass swayed and made a whispering sound—the eternal voice of the lonely prairie.