A lion in winter deserves respect

Sue Clark

When I go up to Jackson in Northern California, I’m not really a

tourist anymore. Locals know me as that “SoCal woman,” who runs up

the grade to Argonaut Road.

Each winter, I jog from downtown Jackson up a fairly steep

mountain road (once past a dead dear) to the gas station on top of

the hill. Gasping and sweating, I buy water and a doughnut, and then

cruise back down the hill, through Detert Park past the swimming

pool, cautiously leaping a chain link fence. (I tripped on this fence

one winter and ended the run with bloody knees). My reward when I get

into town is a coffee and another doughnut at the Swiss Bakery on

Main Street.

I do this to prove I can still do it. I’m at that bravado stage of

my fifties, where I have a checklist of things that I can still do.

(“I may be old, but I still listen to hip-hop, etc.”)

My backup bravado plan is to run three miles up my sister’s road

in Pine Grove, while brandishing a rock for loose dogs. Mountain dogs

scare me, because I’ve seen a few wandering around off leashes. This

is rare, however, since dogs that attack livestock are liable to be

shot.

Fallback plan three is the most pleasant and has no bravado at

all. If my arthritis is flaring up, I walk the same Pine Grove road

with my smallest nephew, Jakob. This is more of a ramble, with stops

for Jakob to point out aspects of Northern California to his sissy

aunt.

“Look, Aunt Sue, that’s poison oak. Don’t touch it,” he warns.

I inspected the shiny leaves carefully. His older brothers and

sister had shown it to me as well, but I still wasn’t sure I could

identify it.

“I have a stick for protection,” Jakob announced.

He was 4 years old, but already a mountain man. Suddenly, he

pointed with the stick to a khaki-colored car coming down the road.

“Look, it’s a ranger.”

The car stopped by us and a man got out. “I wanted you to be aware

of mountain lions in the area, “ he said.

“Mountain lions! Mountain lions! Mountain lions!” Jakob chanted.

He looked scared. I looked scared, too. We were about one mile up the

road from my sister’s place.

“Aren’t they nocturnal?” I asked the ranger.

“Usually,” he said. “There probably won’t be any problem; just

keep an eye out.”

“Nocturnal. Nocturnal,” Jakob said and nervously examined his

stick.

The car drove off, and suddenly the mountain road seemed lonely.

Jakob did that Velcro thing little kids do, and became one with my

hip.

“I’ll fight a mountain lion,” he declared, as we peered into the

shrubbery.

“Let’s get back to your Mom’s house,” I suggested. “It’s almost

dinner time.”

“Are you afraid of a mountain lion?” he asked.

(Jakob could be as annoying as a good therapist.)

“They usually sleep during the daytime,” I answered, continuing to

peer into the forest surrounding the road.

“I’m scared, too,” he assured me, “but I have my stick.”

We walked back home as quickly as a woman with a 4-year-old glued

to her leg can walk. I saw the ranger’s car again after we entered a

little clearing. I flagged him down.

“Will you drive us to my sister’s house?” I asked.

“We are afraid of mountain lions,” Jakob explained.

“Pretty much, “ I said.

After radioing in to his boss, the ranger dropped us off at my

sister’s just in time to see my brother-in-law driving up. His

mission is to torment me, and he was already grinning in

anticipation.

Suffice it to say that he accused me of hitting on the ranger and

being too citified to walk a mile in the woods. All the while, my

sister was darting me irritated looks, because Jakob was now obsessed

with mountain lions, and still chanting about them in a manner which

could only be described as bizarre.

“Have you ever seen one up here? “I asked, attempting to distract

my brother-in-law from his dissection of my love life. His other

mission is to get me married off.

“Bob, remember the truck incident?” My sister sent Jakob to get

something out of his room.

As quickly as he could while Jakob was gone, Bob told me about one

early morning when he went out to warm up the truck for his commute

to Manteca.

He heard a noise in the back of the truck and saw a pair of

startled yellow eyes staring back at him.

He and the lion both screamed, and he ran for the house. When he

went back out a little later the cat was gone.

“It happens, “ he concluded.

When I heard about the tragic deaths and injuries in the South

County wilderness last week, I remembered the lesson I learned in the

Gold Country.

One of the prices you pay for clean mountain air and incredibly

gorgeous wilderness is the chance you will encounter a mountain lion,

a snake or even just poison oak. You need to be prepared. You don’t

take the wilderness for granted, and a stick isn’t going to do it.