{"id":20887,"date":"2022-02-16T14:36:38","date_gmt":"2022-02-16T19:36:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/?p=20887"},"modified":"2022-03-23T14:42:16","modified_gmt":"2022-03-23T18:42:16","slug":"fox-bewitched","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/fox-bewitched\/","title":{"rendered":"Fox Bewitched"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"position: relative; padding-top: max(60%,326px); height: 0; width: 100%;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"position: absolute; border: none; width: 100%; height: 100%; left: 0; right: 0; top: 0; bottom: 0;\" src=\"https:\/\/e.issuu.com\/embed.html?backgroundColor=%23efefef&amp;d=porltand_monthly_fm22&amp;hideIssuuLogo=true&amp;pageNumber=16&amp;u=portlandmagazine\" width=\"300\" height=\"150\" sandbox=\"allow-top-navigation allow-top-navigation-by-user-activation allow-downloads allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-modals allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">You know\u00a0you\u2019re not the most popular kid at camp when your bunkmates slam you into your black\u00a0footlocker\u00a0and lock you inside. With your counselor looking on. (<strong>Camp Wyanoke<\/strong>\u00a0on\u00a0<strong>Lake Winnipesaukee<\/strong>\u00a0no longer exists.) \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">It was my first experience inside the box. I heard footsteps going away. I took a mental snapshot of my new world, black and cornerless. My cherished copy of\u00a0<b>Nathaniel Hawthorne<\/b>\u2019s\u00a0<i>The House of the Seven Gables<\/i>\u00a0was inside the trunk with me, its spine poking into mine. It was too dark to read. I passed out.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">I came to with the box unlocked. I exulted in the icy-sharp air, but this was the last straw. I decided to break out of camp, make a mad dash (2.5 miles) to\u00a0<strong>Wolfeboro<\/strong>, and call my parents (collect) from the phone booth just outside the hardware store with the cool Jitterbug fishing lures. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Outside Wyanoke\u2019s stone gate, on the crest of the hill, a red fox trotted across the road not twenty feet from me. He stopped, turned his head, and eyed me for twenty seconds. He stared so intently I was sure he was about to speak: \u201cAnd just where do you think you\u2019re going?\u201d \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Decades later, I was on an\u00a0<strong>Amtrak<\/strong>\u00a0train passing through snow country in March when I met him again. Through the window I saw tracks heading toward a barbed-wire fence near the top of a hill. My eyes followed until I saw the fox slip up to the barrier. He was too dignified to dig his way underneath. Too lordly to leap over it. He walked directly through the fence like a sorcerer. He turned to look at me over his shoulder.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">\u201cThat\u2019s how it\u2019s done,\u201d he said. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>February\/March<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20249,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[1199],"class_list":["post-20887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-editor","tag-febmarch-2022"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20887"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20887\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21122,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20887\/revisions\/21122"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}