My neighbor acquired a young cat, Moxie, which may have been too curious when it came to stalking large animals. It took her older cat, Mango, about a year to get used to having the newcomer bouncing around in his space. Moxie was a tiny, mottled black-brown cat with long legs and incredible speed. He arrived as a kitten but soon became a flash through my yard. His mistress said he would saunter up to big dogs, a bit cautiously but seemingly without an ounce of fear. He was even cautious with me, as though I might be one of those large animals that he should avoid. Even though I didn’t like it when his curiosity caused him to study birds at my feeders, I didn’t chase him away, because he wore a red collar with a small bell to warn the birds of his presence. I was more comfortable with older Mango, who met me at my mailbox most days and talked me into scratching his back for awhile.

Growing up, I’d never understood why the cats in our house seemed to gravitate toward me rather than my sisters. At one point, when I was a teenager, the cat population at our house had risen to twenty-one. My mother and sisters had become addicted to the cuddly things and allowed feline sex lives to run rampant without any thought to giving them away or getting them spayed. Some of the adult cats became fed up with overcrowding and headed for new terrain. And though some died, there always seemed to be a pregnant female ready to replenish the supply. One round-bellied cat rejected the towel-lined carton my mother had placed near the warmth of the wood stove and insisted on sleeping at the foot of my bed until, in the dark of the night, she gave birth there to the first of four, carried it to my pillow, and caused me to wake up screaming because I thought there was a mouse in my ear. Perhaps the cats came to me because I loved to scratch their heads, or because sometimes I fed them sunfish I’d just caught in the nearby lake.

One spring afternoon I spotted several deer in my backyard, chewing on scrub there.  As I watched from my window, a couple deer wandered into the adjacent field. But the last deer stood still, staring into my wife’s garden. He took one step forward, and then froze.  Another step, and then froze.  I was puzzled about what the deer was staring at.  Then I saw Moxie crawl out of the garden and step slowly toward the deer. Eventually Moxie crept to about three feet from the deer, when they began circling around one another in a tight arc. Moments later the deer walked through the brush into the field to join the others. But when the others wandered off, the "curious" deer stayed behind and bent his nose low toward the scrub that separates my yard from the field. Sure enough, Moxie was hiding in the scrub, watching the deer. When the deer moved closer to him, Moxie climbed a small tree just high enough to watch the deer from above. After awhile, the deer decided that his new friend wasn't coming down to play, and so he trotted off in the direction of his buddies. Moxie climbed down and wandered back my way.

Their innate curiosity about one another seemed a rare phenomenon, but I often wonder if Moxie’s curiosity got him into trouble. The last time I saw Moxie, I watched him stalk a skunk from his house across our front yard and into our back yard, with only a slight stink as it passed our kitchen window. Moxie seemed intelligent enough to stay a reasonable distance behind. But not long afterward, my neighbor said he’d disappeared. I didn’t hunt for Moxie as I had when Mango vacationed under our house. Some intuition told me Moxie had taken the wrong curve in the road, and it made me sad.

I guess all of life is a rare phenomenon, and my connection with animals like Mango, Moxie, and the deer in our yard is just a small part of the animal love I’ve felt by being close to them.

There was another time when I saw a large doe from my studio window. She was feeding on some scrub and had a couple fawns bouncing around her. But she moved awkwardly with her right front leg drooping, not touching the ground. With only three functioning legs, she seemed unlikely to live through a harsh New England winter.

Somehow she lived through another winter and returned to my yard again, but without a fawn. I decided to go outside and approach her. Maybe we could be friends.  Seeing me, she lurched away a short distance and then looked at me. I was surprised how fast she had moved on three legs. I moved a bit closer.  She jumped away a safe distance and looked back. I stayed still and met her gaze. I thought her eyes displayed a spark of intelligence that I couldn’t decipher. I wanted to be closer, but as soon as I moved, she lurched over a wall and was gone.

I thought I should write about an injured deer’s perseverance in overcoming her handicap. Her resilience to overcome the broken leg gave me the hope I needed as I recovered from cancer. But she never appeared again when other deer came, and I knew that her time had finally run out.

I was just as sad then as when Moxie disappeared. I really had loved those animals.

Kurt Schmidt published the novel, "Annapolis Misfit," with Crown Publishers thirteen years after being expelled from the Naval Academy and the chapbook memoir, "Birth of a Risk-Taker," with Bottlecap Press in April 2025. With significant anxiety, he flew in a small plane piloted by his newly-licensed son, who, as an adolescent asked insane questions like "What's Mono Gamus?" Their flight story appeared in The Boston Globe and can be viewed among others at www.kurtgschmidt.com. His nonfiction has appeared in Storyhouse, Discretionary Love, The Mersey Review, The Examined Life Journal, and others.

(Unless you type the author's name
in the subject line of the message
we won't know where to send it.)