Fossegrim…? (Alphabitch, Day 6)

Today is Tuesday.  YES!  Of course.  It’s also Election Day, and I’m hoping to head to the polls tonight with my husband and daughter (don’t worry, I will).  I’ve already received two texts from the current mayor asking what time I’m going and urging me not to forget (I won’t).  I checked the hours and I’ve got till 8PM (please stop texting).  SO I’D BETTER WRITE QUICK.

Tuesdays may or may not mean much to you personally, but they hold a very special place in my week.  Because Tuesdays are… (drumroll please)… ADVENTURE TIME!  TAHHH-DAHHHH!  Adventure Time is what all dogs call the greatest time on earth.  It’s like their birthday, and Christmas, and when they find cat poop buried in the neighbor’s yard – all rolled into one!

Adventure Time is a weekly 2.5 hour trail walk with four or five unleashed dogs.  It takes place on Tuesdays.  The day of the week it consistently rains, snows, or blows the most in southern Maine.  I’m not sure how this happens, I mean statistically speaking we do have FIVE workdays to choose from, but somehow Tuesdays just get lucky.  For this reason, I started buying lottery tickets every Tuesday.  One Mega Millions, one Powerball, and a $1 scratch card.  It’s been months and months and the most I’ve won so far is $12.  But knowing Tuesdays the way I do, I know it’s just a matter of time.

When I started dog walking last October I was told I would now be handling Adventure Time.  There might have been a mention of the weather and someone else having had enough.  Either way, each Monday night without fail I check the forecast.  Last night before bed I checked and it said today (Tuesday) it would rain.  SURPRISE!  Just joking, we all knew it was gonna rain, but I was pleasantly surprised that it would be in the mid-50s.  That’s raincoat weather and the longer I can forgo a parka, the better.  I’ve spent oh-so-many Adventure Times swathed in oh-so-much more.  Plus, I really like my raincoat.  It’s long, so I can wear leggings without wondering whether everyone I pass is looking at my ass.  Plus, it’s red!  And not some boring shade of red, but one so spectacularly vivid you can see me from outer space.  So I can’t possibly be mistaken for a deer.  AND YOU CAN’T BE TOO CAREFUL.

As mentioned before Tuesdays are my “long days” and on long days I must prepare.  Not as fully as say for a colonoscopy, but still.  There’s no potty in the woods.  Peeing is one thing, but having to poop in the woods surrounded by a bunch of rowdy dogs during hunting season?  HELL NO.  Which reminds me of a funny story from this past winter…

My husband and I have private jokes.  One of them involves a Nordic entity called the Fossegrim.  Basically a hot shirtless man who hangs out in the woods and lures maidens with his magical song (hubba hubba).  I forget precisely what musical instrument he favors; maybe a fiddle?  Anyway, I was in the woods one morning this winter for Adventure Time.  It was 9AM, roughly 10 degrees, and I had five unleashed, pumped up dogs ready to RUN.  But I needed to pee, REALLY badly.  So the dogs and I started making our way back towards a place I call “The Party Pit.”  “The Party Pit” is an area in the woods where summertime parties happen.  It’s this little area, a little off the beaten path, though the dogs and I can find it easily week after week.  It’s basically a little secluded nest set up on a small hill, with a stone-ringed fire pit, a few lawn chairs, and a lot of empty beer cans.  It’s nice.  Because of its rather private location it’s where I go to take a leak, pretty much weekly.  And whenever I squat to relieve myself, dogs swarming around me, I always chuckle and say, “I’m sure I’m not the first person to pee here.  Heheh.”  Honestly, it never gets old.

So the dogs and I are making our way to the party pit, we’re probably halfway or two-thirds of the way there, when all of a sudden I hear something off in the woods, right in the direction we’re heading.  It’s this weird noise – it alerts the dogs and we all stop to listen.  All of a sudden I start hearing someone playing (I kid you not) a pan flute.  I AM NOT JOKING.  I stand there with my mouth agape.  I look around and the dogs are looking at me and each other like even they are wigged out.  It’s 9AM, it’s flipping freezing, and someone is just hanging out in the woods playing the pan flute?  WHAT THE HOLY HELL?  We stand there a few seconds more, and then the weird wind instrument music continues.  NOT constant, as if someone was listening to music on a speaker or their phone, but haltingly, as if someone is actually playing a pan flute.  The dogs are just standing there, stick still.  ME TOO.  Because it’s just TOO HONKING WEIRD.  No one was in the parking lot when we arrived and we’re walking INTO the woods.  We haven’t seen a soul.  I could only laugh to myself and say, “Fossegrim…???” before turning around and HOOFING it in the opposite direction.  Later, my daughter suggested it might have been Pan himself.  Have I been in the woods too long?

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