Unknown month, 2002 File dated 3/30/02
This is another dream from college days, with the obvious inspiration of recent cougar sitings in the area. Obviously the neighborhood description means little to anyone who hasn't been there, but there was an actual cougar siting about one house up from the place this dream took place. Having grown up in the same place, I was very familiar with the neighborhood, so the layout and details of the setting were very clear and accurate.
As with some other older dreams, the format was edited into a story format for my old webpage.
The neighborhood we live in is fairly suburban, but we get wild animals now and again, raccoons in winter, looking for handouts in people's back yards, coyotes in summer, wandering into the city and occasionally attacking people's cats that are out at night. One year we lost our neighbor's cat to one, all they found the next morning was pieces of fur. Sometimes out in the county there've been cougar spottings, and this spring, about a week ago, there was a cougar spotting a few blocks away from our house.
The articles in the paper mentioned several sightings, but every time the cougar was gone when the police got there. The latest sighting, the one near our house, is an area where several little kids live. I walk past that house almost every day, either on my way to a friend's house, or the bus stop.
Today I was headed to the little Yew St. Center down the hill to return a video. Still remembering the article I glanced over at the little alley mentioned in the article, the way I have every day for the past week. I could hear the voices of the kids, but they were playing something hidden in the bushes. I continued on until the point where the street is flat. Wandering slowly, enjoying the sunshine, I noticed a woman across the street talking on a cell phone. I don't know the people who live at that house, but it looked like they were re-landscaping the yard. She was by a half finished gazebo, and there were sections of ready-made fence around. On the other side of a section of fence, invisible to the woman, was the cougar.
I know a little about predatory animals. I know not to run, and not to look too stealthy either. The cougar was just sniffing around, uninterested in either me or the woman. I casually walked across the street and approached the woman in her yard, she looked only mildly annoyed to see a complete stranger demanding her attention and continued with her phone conversation. I physically turned her around and pointed at the section of fence. It took her a moment before she noticed the animal's movement through the gaps in the wood, then her eyes slowly widened as the cougar's head emerged briefly from around one edge of the fence. I calmly whispered to her to call 911. Incredibly, she excused herself unobtrusively from the conversation she was already in before dialing 911. She couldn't hit the numbers right the first three tries because her hands were shaking so badly. A man emerged from the house and came to see what was going on, when he saw the cougar he was wise enough to not say anything loudly. As the woman tried to explain in whispered tones to the police, the cougar began covering a larger area, coming within view of us, but still pointedly ignoring us. It was then that I noticed a cub with her. The woman protested a little louder as the police tried to hang up on her, she had turned away to the gazebo again and her husband was in too much shock to move as the cougar approached, sniffing the woman's arm.
The police hung up. The woman turned white and went dead silent. Moving half by instinct, I put my own arm in front of hers and pushed her hand back towards her, moving slowly the entire time. The cougar sniffed my hand and made snorting noises. Looking over it's shoulder I saw two cubs now. Both were large enough to walk fine, but too small to pose any threat. The cougar was investigating us out of curiousity, I knew that much. We were in no serious danger. Yet.
Heat on my arm, damp, then the cougar had it's mouth around my arm. Still just curious. Still just investigating a strange and unfamiliar creature. No prey would act as we did, yet we were not predators either, our actions served as a confusion to it. And we had to keep it interested. We had to keep the cougar near us if they were going to catch it. But having one's arm in a cougar's mouth is not something anyone can calmly stand for, and despite all the reasonings going through my head, I was absolutely terrified. Gently I put one hand near the cougar's brow, slowly removing my arm. I've always had a way with animals, but wild animals can only stand so much confusion. I got my arm out of the cougar's mouth, but now we were a potential threat. Up until this point we hadn't been moving much, but now I had made an action, I made us into creatures with a capability to do something. The cougar showed it's teeth, snarling low. Three cubs now. When did there get to be three cubs?! The man behind me began to move his wife away, slowly, but showing fear. Damn, they're acting like prey, I'll have to distract it... I did not move, and since I was still in front of the cougar, this in and of itself was a distraction. Behind me the strangers stopped their retreat once behind the gazebo. The snarling quieted. I was sniffed again, my arm was being nosed once more, and there was the damp of a mouth. My mind raced for dogs, a touch under the jaw is submission... but what for cats...??!? I reached slowly, not knowing what else to try, I touched the cougar's chin, just enough for it to be felt, not enough to be construed as a threat. An act of submission might calm her, and it still wouldn't be a prey action. The cat's head moved away, she moved away, around the fence section to be with her cubs again.
I couldn't restrain a sigh of relief. The cougar was on the other side of the fence, visible, and showing no signs of leaving, and I didn't need to do anything more to keep her here. Lights, police cars with lights but no sirens, and somehow my parents had showed up. I moved away from the slowly gathering crowd. I must have been standing in shock for a few minutes, because now they had caught the cougar. They had something around both front paws... small nooses I think, like what they use to catch stray dogs with. She was caught, there were ropes around her, tranquilizer guns being aimed. I moved away. A voice in my mind. A woman's voice, terrified. "I don't want to go!! My children -! No! NO! They'll take my mind away! They'll make me forget! My children!!! I don't want to forget!!! I Don't Want To Forget!!!! The thunk of the darts. The kittens were being rounded up, and I could faintly hear their mewling. I don't want to forget my children! I don't want to forget who I am.... The voice was fading. I realized I was on my knees at the edge of the unfamiliar yard, my back to the crowd and my hands over my ears. I was unnoticed until the police began to pull away. There was only a faint voice in my mind. A woman's voice, terrified, saying nothing. I have always had a way with animals.