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Monday, June 02, 2008

A Deer Memory

This is Steven Petrick Posting.

At one point in my time in the Army I was given a no-notice assignment as a reward for previous performance. What that performance was can wait for another time, but the gist of the assignment was that I suddenly, at the end of a long week of effort, had to go from Fort Campbell, Kentucky (which is right on the border with Tennessee) to Camp Grayling, Michigan (which is about as far north in Michigan as you can go. Travel was by P.O.V. (Personally Owned Vehicle, i.e., my own car), I could not depart before close of business (the end of the duty day), and had to be there early the next morning.

Yes, it was going to be a long drive, and I was already somewhat sleep deprived.

However, Lt. Sviontek had been previously selected for this assignment, and as the officer I was replacing had been his ride, now I was his ride, so I would at least have someone else to drive. Even better, someone who was familiar with a standard transmission. (I favor standard transmissions, and have learned NOT to let people who have not learned to use one drive the car.)

The bad news was the Lt. Sviontek was about as sleep deprived as I was for the same general reason.

We did our best, and crossed into Michigan sometime after Midnight. (Despite getting lost at least once and finding ourselves heading West instead of East on one particular stretch of interstate . . . what can I say, we were both very tired.)

As we drove up the interstate, Lt. Sviontek had fallen asleep. The road we were on at that point was a four lane dual divided highway (at least as I remember it). There was no other traffic in view (no headlights ahead, none behind us). No nearby towns, no sources of light other than my headlights and starlight (I could tell you what the phase of the moon was, but I do not remember it being overcast).

Suddenly my headlamps filled with deer!

There was a herd of them all over the road, and I was heading into it at somewhere between 65 and 70 miles per hour. I slammed on the brakes (which was only going to slow the speed of impact if I hit one) and swerved desperately for perceived spaces of darkness (where the headlamps did not appear to be reflecting off deer hide).

Somehow, I got through without making contact.

The braking and radical swerving woke up Sviontek, but by the time he came awake enough to be cognizant, the deer were past. And while I explained what had just happened, it was quite clear that he thought I had dozed off and the car had woken up to find the car about to leave the road. However, my heart was now pumping and for a few more minutes, at least, I was going to be wide awake. So Sviontek started to doze off again.

My heart rate and breathing were about back to normal levels when . . .

the headlamps again filled with deer!

Once more I braked and swerved for dark spots to try to avoid a collision, but this time Sviontek, who was not completely out, snapped up. Both of us were looking to the right as, in a flash, the head of a buck appeared in the passenger side window looking down into the car, at least eight points, and somehow under-lit (as if the light was coming up from beneath him).

Seatbelts do save lives, as the only thing that kept Sviontek from leaping from his seat into mine in startled reaction was his seatbelt.

Somehow we again made it through the herd without an impact. We drove on for another mile or so until we came to a place where it was possible to pull off the road and stop. At that point I advised Sviontek that I was done, the only way we were going to make it the rest of the way to Camp Grayling was if he drove. Which he did.