Mysterious Snorts in the Dark

I was walking along, near the treeline when I heard something very near me in the brush followed by menacing snorts. I know it was just a startled deer, which, frankly, made me feel like a submarine, silent and unnoticed in the sea of the night, but whoa, it also scared the shit out of me! My heart started racing, my hands started sweating.

And then I realized that deer was as alarmed as I was. We both had not realized someone else was so close and we both stood there a second, our hearts racing, and then we moved on. It was that moment of shared exhilaration that struck me.

I’m still listening to Limetown, for better or worse. This week’s episode was, indeed, for better or worse. But I was deeply moved by the story of the pig and the guy who learned to telepathically connect with it. The way the pig’s feelings were pure and deep felt true to me, and the value a person might get out of having access to those feelings, also true. As I walked past that deer, snorting in the early morning dark, feeling that kind of primal Oh!, I felt honored and surprised to share that with the deer.

This weekend, someone said to me, “Oh, that’s right. You’re into all that weird occult stuff, aren’t you?” I guess I’ve been into it long enough that it doesn’t seem weird to me anymore. These nine nights, not that there have been nine yet, I’ve been thinking a lot about connections, about the things that tie us together and, more importantly, the ways that crucial ideas get held onto. How the gods stay with us even once we’re monotheistic, almost unrecognizable.

Here, take this for example. Thor is a big guy, with a big beard, straightforward, with useful farm animals for pets. He carries a tool he can use as a weapon. He’s a friend to people and likes them a great deal. We’ve already talked about the ways our modern Santa Claus has some of those same trappings, how Santa seems to take the things we couldn’t leave behind about Odin and Thor and repackages them into something we can keep, even deep into Christianity.

But put Thor in your mind’s eye. Not the Marvel version. The big old brawny Viking. Now, give him some practical work pants, a flannel shirt, a stocking cap. Switch out his hammer for an ax, the goats for an ox. He’s still friendly and helpful to people.

But now he’s Paul Bunyan.