"On Thinking About Ironic Parallels"
Matt Smythe
The dogs bolted again. Didn’t even feign worry about consequence. Out the door and directly into the thicket behind the house before I had hung my keys and put my prescriptions on the counter.
Sunlight, fresh air, the world splitting wide open at their first burst off the top step of the porch. Brains suddenly saturated with dopamine that would carry them through hours of cattail swamp thorn brush deer trail freedom. Eating dead squirrel deer raccoon flesh, winter scavenger-worn vertebrae and carpal bones swallowed whole. Rolling in fox and coyote shit and anything with the glorious smell of rot. Eyes black on fire. Ears pinned back. Ravenous as addicts. There is no tomorrow.
I used to chase them. Rush to put on boots. Whistle-shout my way into the woods. Pissed off and cursing. Vowing to throttle them both. Mud spray up my pantlegs, thorns raising lines of blood, I’d keep at tit till I found them. Cowering in a slow sulk to me with tails curled tight. I’d snap leashes on their muddied, stinking collars while they came down from their brains-full of junk. Nose to tail covered, tongues lolling, panting, chests full of kickdrum, bellies aching to betray.
They pay four days for their run. Rotten puke turning out bones. Liquid shit. joints refusing to loosen. they limp to their water, lap slowly. Dog food goes untouched. whine on their bed as the consequence of their blind instincts works through their intestines.
Now, after so many times, I don’t chase. I’ll drive streets in town to see if I can catch them in the open, but then return home and wait for a call from a stranger who found them on their porch, in their yard or nosing circles with their dog, their names and my number on their collars. I’ve resigned myself to the fact that the call might deliver me to them dead on the side of the road.
On the back steps in the March afternoon sun, waiting, I’ve lost the anger. My own destructive blind runs. I’m beginning to understand. I grab my keys one more time.
This week on the Savage Wonder podcast…
Matt Smythe is a staff writer for Free Range American. He hails from the Finger Lakes region of western New York. An Army veteran and lifelong outdoorsman, Matt suffers from an inability to sit still. If he’s not in the woods, or on the water, he’s scheming ways to get there. His work has appeared in Gray’s Sporting Journal, the Fly Fish Journal, The Drake, Southern Culture on the Fly, Revive, Midcurrent, TROUT Magazine, and a handful of other non-outdoors-related magazines and literary journals. He recently published a book of poetry with Dead Reckoning Collective titled Revision of a Man.
Folks - the Parlor is back!
Starting this Saturday night, downtown Cornwall is once again the place to see great theater with Joshua Harmon’s 2018 Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle award winning dramady Admissions. Drinks, dessert, a hilarious live performance, professional actors, an intimate unforgettable space, pay-what-you-can tickets…it simply does not get better than this.
I’m not going to lie, we’re poking the bear a little with Admissions. It’s not a traditional comedy. It’s a provocative yet even-handed look at the college admissions process and the hypocrisies, gaffes, primal screams, and noble intentions behind race-based admissions. Issues of race, class, and privilege are confronted head-on with Joshua Harmon’s straightforward, unsparing, blunt dialogue. It’s a night of satire, drama and social commentary that will leave you questioning, laughing, and shaking your head.
As always, you’re welcome to show up and hope for a cancellation. But if you really want to see the show, why not book now and save yourself the uncertainty?