Today as we were driving to Sarah Lawrence College to see a dance performance that our daughter had helped to choreograph, we flew by a flailing dear in the middle of a hideously busy highway. We pulled over immediately.
As I walked back up the highway, cars flew by. I was sure that I would see the deer shattered in the road. But instead, it had made its way to the side of the road, helped by two young women who had seen it and stopped before we had. The accident had happened in the northbound lane, and somehow the deer ended up on the southbound side.
Its back legs were broken, and it was obviously in terrible pain. The two young women had called the police, who said they were coming but that the police could not shoot the deer. It was an animal control issue.
Here is the shocking part. A young man stopped by the side of the road not to help, but to video the struggling women and the dying deer. During the 30 minutes we waited for the police to come, hundreds of cars tore by us and only one person, a woman, stopped to inquire if we were ok.
When the police did finally arrive, the young officer said that he would shoot the deer. By then, it had dragged itself even further into the thicket. He did shoot it, which was the kindest thing. We prayed the Buddhist prayer for the dying as it died: om tara tutare ture soha. Over and over.
This is a terrible story. The violent death of this deer is terrible enough. The worst part, however, is the indifference of others who witnessed it, and the idiotic voyeur with the camera. That is the unforgivable part.
There we were, four women, standing guard, waiting, not willing to leave an animal suffering. That does not make us heroic. It makes us human. Suffering should touch us. It should draw us in. It should open our hearts, stop us in our tracks, elicit our best selves.
I am uncomfortable on a soapbox. But this made me very, very angry, deeply pained. I was reminded of a conversation that I overheard at a cafe. A woman, laughing derisively, said to her dining partner, “Oh, she’s the type that stops to take a squirrel off the road.” Yes, I am.