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It feels like we’re all just hanging on for deer life
Cheryl O'Donovan
Updated: May 11, 2012 3:14PM
After dropping off my youngest at basketball practice, I headed toward Golf Road and home.
It was between dusk and dark, and I could barely see the tawny animal on the median. Eyes slowly blinking, head raised, she appeared stricken, trying to get up on her front legs and couldn’t.
The doe had obviously been struck by a car.
I signaled right, and the van tires bumped over the potholed parking lot in front of Dairy Queen. Snapping open my cell, I dialed the non-emergency police number.
God bless the dispatcher, she didn’t think me a fool for calling about an animal.
“The deer near the hospital, ma’am?”
“Yes. I’m pretty sure.”
“We were already alerted to it. We’re sending someone out to her.”
When I got home, I told my husband and oldest son about the injured deer.
“Hate to think of the damage to the car that struck it,” my husband said. Then he joked. “Hey. All that free venison.”
I remained quiet.
He pulled me into a bear hug. “You and this ‘Bambi’s mother’ thing.”
My older son paced around us, suddenly more agitated. “I forgot to tell you. Jake’s dad saved someone’s life this weekend. The softball coach had a heart attack. Jake’s dad administered CPR and revived him.”
Wow. I’d never known anyone who had saved another person’s life. How grateful the man’s family would be that Jake’s dad was there to save him. Life can be so miraculous and random.
Later that night, I returned to pick up my youngest son from practice and told him about Jake’s dad and the deer.
I peered ahead into the night, tracking the headlights. “Maybe she’s OK, too.”
“Slow down, Mom.”
Lifting my foot off the pedal, I prayed no irate driver would rear-end me. Up ahead were clusters of street lamps and hospital lights. The female deer had been struck around here. Maybe the police had gotten her; maybe she was in a vet’s clinic. Maybe she was alive like the softball coach.
Her stiff, lifeless body was on the median. A horn honked, and we had to speed on by.
