Two Foxes

We watch for the fox, Bird and I, and today we saw him, both thin and puffed with winter, running across the snow to cross Route 6.

The fox taps something primitive in Bird, and when we see him, Bird loses his mind, barking, desperate to run after the fox and protect his herd, I imagine.

I stopped my car on the quiet road and watched. The fox got to the strip of snow and trees that makes up the median separating Route 6 east and west. I could see a car headed towards us. “Run!” I whispered. I prayed the driver wasn’t texting or otherwise distracted.

But then the fox paused and looked back. A slightly smaller fox had emerged and was deciding whether to cross the street towards the first fox.

There was something in the look in the larger fox’s face that felt like Sophie’s Choice. Oh, god. What to do what to do? Being attached and keeping not only your own self but another self safe is the work of the mighty and the angels, not small creatures who have control over so little in their lives. Creatures like foxes and dogs and human beings.

A police car had pulled up to the intersection that I was currently blocking. I pointed to the fox on the right, the policeman waved,  and I slowly drove past the delicate, undecided fox while Bird bounced from window to window in the car, barking at both sides of the road. Taylor Swift was singing Cause I loved you. I swear I loved you. Till my dying day. I didn’t have it in myself to go with grace, a song that always made me teary.

I tried to watch everything at the same time, the road in front of me, the police car behind me, the east-bound car passing me, searching for the foxes I could no longer see. In my rear-view mirror I tracked the taillights of the east bound car, hoping to see the brake lights go on. Hoping for a glimpse of foxes streaking across the road, together. But all I could see were trees and flashes of snow-covered street.

 I thought about the torn look on the fox’s face as he had moved forward and looked back at the same time and a wail erupted out of my body like the ocean breaking through a wall. The waves of grief kept coming, and I made so much noise wailing and crying that Bird jumped into the back seat and got quiet.  

The police car was still behind me as I turned right onto Old Cemetery. I wondered if the policeman could hear me through my windows, through the space between our cars, through his window. I wondered if he would think I was on drugs if he followed me and pulled me over when I cried to him about the look at the fox’s face.

Maybe the agony of separation, of self-preservation in a death-struggle with love, was what led to the Big Bang. Maybe those feelings were so huge that space, time, and energy had to be created to hold them.

What I am saying is what I saw in the fox’s face was I will wait for you even if it kills me, and, also, But something in my might make me run.

And, maybe, what the fox was showing me was, We have either other’s backs. You just have to open your eyes to see, Foxy Lady.