TOWN TRAIL TURKEY TROT

April break ends, and, again, I get done only a fraction of what I'd planned.  My basement still sits half-cleared, my house is still in disarray, and I never once turned on my school laptop that I hauled all the way home.

I did, however, enjoy the beautiful weather.  I took several walks and discovered (much to my amazement and stupidity) a small pond perfect for winter ice skating within spitting distance of my neighborhood, where I have resided now for twenty-one years without ever knowing this gem existed.  Right now the pond is sitting quietly in the woods,  hosting occasional wildlife that lives in the small triangular few acres of woods abutted on all sides by houses and busy streets.

Today I take what will probably be my last April break trek.  The first half of my walk is almost always uphill, so I go up and around the west side of the prep school campus, cutting through one of its service roads rather than overtake the professor walking along in front of me.  Of course, I assume he is a professor from his clothing, slower pace, and the amount of paperwork he is cradling in his arms. 

Once I hit the main road again, it's a nice steady down-grade, so I start jogging.  I have terrible stamina lung-wise, but I make it about a quarter mile.  I think I will stop at the hydrant, but I keep going and round the corner to a street that doubles back the way I came.  I walk-jog along it, turn down another small hill,  and make my way toward the churches.  I can head down the tarred road and go home, which would be fine.  Or, I can make my way to the town-owned path through the woods that I finally explored earlier in the week.

My decision is made when a carload of teenagers drives by in a small car with NH plates and harasses me out the window.  When they make a second pass, I make my decision.  While they are presumably turning around (probably because I chucked them the bird and yelled, "Fuck you" on their second pass), I take off into the woods at a decent clip. 

As soon as I am certain my bright colored shirt cannot be seen from the street, I slow down to a regular jog.  When I get to the Frost Point (two paths diverge in a yellow wood, or some such), I turn right because this path goes by the little pond and comes out closer to my street.  I am jogging along at a decent pace, just about to the wooden bridge/path, when I suddenly see three turkeys -- two of them are huge with full plumage.

The last thing I want now is to be attacked in the middle of the woods by three pissed-off turkeys.  First of all, it will ruin the small remainder of my break, and secondly, I cannot even imagine my long-suffering embarrassment should I make the local papers: "Teacher attacked by turkeys on town trail..."  It's a goddamned alliterative nightmare.

I stop abruptly, back up carefully, then hightail it and run my ass off for about a hundred yards.  Instead of going completely back the way I came, I turn right again and hit the street about three hundred yards down from my originally intended exit point.  When I get to the other end of the trail via the street, the end where I wanted to come out, I walk back in toward the pond from the other side, hoping to get a photo of the turkeys, but they are no longer there.  I can hear them in the brush yards away, but they are no longer blocking the path.

I head back to the road and continue to my neighborhood.  As I spot the local kids playing on the other side of my fence, I sneak up and yell, "BOO!"  I figure if my heart rate has to go up on account of some turkeys, I might as well extend the favor to some unsuspecting eight-year-old kids whose break, like mine, is sadly over.