Evergreen & Grey Fox

There are very few nights that I sleep through and Thursday into Friday was no exception. I woke up in a drenching peri menopausal sweat, spinning around in search of the elusive cold spot in my bed when I heard the sound of a loud and exasperated sigh. I live with four other humans so I am no stranger to weird noises and things that go bump in the night. My first instinct was that Maire had crawled into bed with me and was snoring her way until the morning light. Wrong. Maire was fast asleep in her own bed.

The sighing/breathing continued and as I slowly came to an awake state, I became more invested in understanding the origin of this sound. “Hhhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaa.” I heard every ten seconds or so spaced apart by 2 or 3 minute intervals. “What IS that?” I asked aloud, wanting to wake anyone up who would join me in this mystery quest. My bedroom is the very one that Mom and Dad shared up until about a year ago when we set up their digs downstairs on the main floor to limit the need to climb stairs. This did not deter Dad, however, from trying to go upstairs “to bed” or, on one occasion, ending up in that bedroom after I had gone to work one day. Naturally, I thought recently deceased Dad was somehow stuck in purgatory which happened to be his, now my, bedroom. “Dad?” I whimpered. Don’t judge. It was now 3:03 AM.

I pressed record on my phone’s camera and secured video evidence of the frightening sounds I was hearing. My biggest fear of all was that I was having auditory hallucinations. As you can imagine, I have no room for schizophrenia in my life and was determined to prove that I was not, in fact, “going crazy.” When I rewatched my video, I could hear the heavy sighing clear as day and hoped that when I shared it with others that they would hear it too and, more importantly, help me identify the source of the noise so that I could sleep again. After searching the internet with sentences like “what animal sounds like heavy breathing under my window?” and discovering that I could have a critter living in my eaves, I ended up in the bowels of the internet on a Reddit and then a Quora thread that confirmed that I was not alone in this experience. Neither of these sights, however, told me what the sound was. Ugh.

Despite my fear, I decided that no matter what it was, rest was far more important. Back to sleep I went knowing that my mission in just a couple hours was going to be to investigate what had awoken me. “What what what the actual f*** is this animal sound that woke me up at 3 AM??” I asked Thomas, my friends, and the Facebook community around 6 in the morning. Although a velociraptor was his first suggestion, his second idea was a fox. I had heard a screaming fox in the woods before having only discovered that by Googling the question “what animal sounds like a screaming woman?” I entertained this idea for a minute but decided that this particular noise, however, did not remind me of that experience. After consulting with many and exploring a slew of strange animal noises on the internet, I finally landed on the grey fox, not the screaming red kind.

With a bark/vocalization that was described as “gravelly”, I set about to find recordings of this canine creature and found a confirming video. “That’s it!” I said to myself, listening to the hissing and exasperated sigh at full volume. “Hallelujah, I can sleep again.” I added. One, I know what animal it was. Two, I am certain that Dad is, in fact, NOT stuck in purgatory. I’m not sure why this experience rocked my world so much except to say that, perhaps, I’m still a scared little girl at the ripe age of 45. However, the things that scare me can no longer lead to paralysis. Now, I must decide if the monsters under my bed are friend, foe, or downright freaky and I need to start sleeping with a bat and a crucifix. When I woke to the sound of heavy breathing in my room, I didn’t scream or shudder. I was equally unnerved and intrigued. Too shaken to sleep? Nope. I had no problem with that. I worship my rest as hot flashes continue to reign supreme.

Over the past few weeks I have been reading a lot of Mary Oliver’s poetry. One might say that I’m a little obsessed with it as I am, as many know, prone to fixations. What I have learned is that when I get like that with anything, it is best to just embrace it and see what I find there. After all, there are far worse things than poetry that I could fixate on. As I have pored over American Primitive, the collection that won Oliver the Pulitzer Prize, I have discovered a way to live in awe of nature and the present moment. I don’t have a lot of time on my hands to engage myself in a novel so poetry seems to be just what I need—short sweet nuggets of writing to marinate in and make my own. I wondered how Oliver would have captured her thoughts about the grey fox I heard. I’m working on a poem for that very reason about our constant fear of, fight against, and eventual surrender to the unknown. Life, no doubt, will constantly throw mysteries and struggles our way with very little regard for our ability to handle them. Although I have pitifully few answers, I will continue to seek more truths with the same tenacity I employed to determine the nature of the sighs that interrupted my sleep. What a joy it is to know that I share this life and these woods with a creature that shatters silence and disturbs comfort. If I were to meet him, I would say thank you.