INCIDENT REPORT #5

It is snowing in Portland! Right now! Falling snow is among my favorite five things in the world. I have to run outside with Emmett right away because it's too warm to last. Meanwhile, in Park Rapids, MN, it is one degree above zero and the snow is already several inches deep, and, apparently, everyone is drunker than usual. Plus they have guns. (One week left of deer season.) Here, from the Park Rapids Enterprise, the Incident report:

A Bemidji State University student reported leaving on foot from a party in Helga Township because she felt "uncomfortable," needs to get to Bemidji; Kids were reported spinning around a corner in Park Rapids; A caller reported her mother called her and said the neighbor "beat her up but she was too intoxicated to call" so her daughter was making the call; An East Crooked Lake resort manager reported a caller asking about the resort, sounds suspicious, may be related to a string of burglaries; A Park Rapids male reported a female contributing to minors, throwing a party after getting her paycheck, caller sounds intoxicated; An intoxicated male was reported walking in the ditch on Highway 64 north; Careless snowmobile driving was reported; A Park Rapids caller reported hearing female screaming; A caller reported windows frozen over in her apartment, considers it a hazard should there be a fire, wants documentation; Five vehicles were towed for snow removal; L&M called regarding a customer who was irate about a van parked in the handicapped spot, driver is not handicapped; A Lake Emma Township caller reported her husband was out deer hunting and did not return, she yelled for him and he is yelling for help, tree stand fell, Air Care launched; A caller reported the rafters in her house are on fire; A Park Rapids caller reported going out and getting drunk, giving her debit card to her boyfriend to buy pop and now there's $200 missing from the card; A Guthrie Township caller reported a car drove up and the driver shot a deer in her yard; A porcupine was reported under a Nevis porch.

When I was a kid, we had to wear blaze-orange vests when we walked down the driveway to wait for the school bus. (We live in the woods.) And when we let the dog outside, she wore an orange Park Rapids Panthers hockey jersey. (My friend's yellow lab had been killed by a bowhunter.) After deer season, Shady would occasionally drag random pieces of deer into the yard--a leg, a bone, once a head, or once, a whole rotting spine. In town, deer are tied to the tops of cars and piled in the backs of pickups parked on Main Street. Tall heaps of hides at the gas stations. In school, I would literally have to stick my fingers in my ears to avoid the trauma of people's gruesome hunting stories, classic crawled-a-mile-bleeding-to-death stuff, which they relished retelling.

The Enterprise has always published a hunting photo or two, depending on space, but now thanks to the internets they have expanded into The Game Room. Here you will find photos of toddlers gripping antlers and smiling teens (and preteens) cradling the bleeding heads of deer and bears they have "harvested." ("The neighbors should be able to sleep secure knowing that their flower and vegetable gardens can safely sleep through the winter.")