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Excerpt from Conversations With Sasquatch, The Encounter.

Chapter 2

     Talking to a Sasquatch would probably qualify me as being a delusional schizophrenic or having some such mentally manufactured label from the Diagnostic Manual of Mental Disorders.  Rest assured, I am more sane than the writers and creators of that psychiatric flap-trap.  As a Sasquatch said in our first conversation a little over a week ago, “Humans are blind to the world of the Sasquatch.”

     Exactly why I was chosen, I haven’t got a clue.  All I know is that today I have an appointment to meet with him once again near that auspicious cedar ridge that runs along the banks of Big Creek, in Lewiston, Michigan.

     I do not take this meeting lightly.  The fear that was inexplicably absent during our first encounter is in full force as I lock my Mazda and begin my traipse into the greening woods.

     As always, I find myself getting unwound and relaxed by the sanctuary of the forest.  There is a lush carpet of fresh moss, wintergreen and huckleberry as I begin to cut a trajectory toward the ridge where I had previously shared mushrooms with a being that claimed to be immortal.  As I walk, I am suddenly struck with the notion that Sasquatch might like a bag of fresh wintergreen.  I, myself, love to chew on the minty leaves, which are cool and relaxing.  I kneel down, pluck a new sprout and pop it into my mouth.  I then gather a few handfuls of the dark green fingers and slip them into the small Ace Hardware bag I always carry for gathering purposes. I succinctly remember Sasquatch telling me that humans had once been much more attuned to the gathering of the medicinal and nutritional gifts of nature.  Is it possible my penchant for such was what had drawn this Bigfoot to engage me?

     I don’t know.  There are doubts.  I’m still feeling a bit dumbstruck and unbelieving.  I have to work quite hard to suspend my recurring thoughts that Sasquatch was nothing more than a figment of my overactive imagination.  Had I eaten (like some have suggested) the wrong mushroom by mistake?  Was it possible I had simply hallucinated and manufactured my whole Sasquatch experience from the far reaches of a childhood memory?

     Over the years, I must admit, I really hadn’t thought much about Sasquatch.  I’ve had no particular reason to do so.  I’m a busy person, both purposeful and happy.  I think little of the past and focus on the present and the future.

     As I continue my trek towards Big Creek, my childhood memory of Sasquatch floods back as if a dam has burst inside my head.  I find myself emotionally present in the excitement of the time, the utter bug-eyed blinking and wiping of my eyes during those fateful moments I laid eyes on him bathing in the river near my fishing hole.  I am overcome with a hot flash of perspiration.  Adrenalin rushes and vibrates through my body as I re-experience running helter-skelter up the bank of the river to reach the deer camp where my father is playing poker and drinking whiskey with his pals.

     I breathlessly arrive as Al Kaline is stepping up to the plate with runners on first and third in the top of the ninth in a tight game against the Minnesota Twins.  My dad and his pals are glued to the tinny squawk of a small transistor radio, intently listening as Ernie Harwell sets the stage for the next pitch.

     I shake my father’s arm violently to get his attention and shriek incoherently about the monster bathing in the river.  My dad’s eyes blink rapidly as he slowly tries to bring me into focus.  When he finally registers my presence, he frowns uncomprehendingly and remains as lethargic as a toad.

     “Not now!” he grumbles.

     I tug and push even harder, beseeching him to come and see the hairy man that looks bigger than a bear.

     “Sorry guys,” he groans, “the young tyke is always dreaming up ghosts and things that go bump in the night.”

     “No!” I exclaim, “He’s really there!  He’s down by the river where the sunfish are!”

     “Now son, go play.  We’ll all be ready to leave in a few.  Right now the Tiger’s are trying to beat the Twins.  Let your dad finish his game.”

     Forgotten and dismissed, I am overwhelmed by the force of his rejection and disbelief.  Coming from my dad, it presses down hard on my young heart.  He hadn’t even considered for a moment that what I had seen could possibly be true.  I was just a kid with nothing better to do than make things up.  And yes, I often did make things up, just not Sasquatch taking a bath in the river.

     As I neared Big Creek I shook off the memory and began my gradual descent down the ridge toward our destined meeting spot.  As I did so, the hackles on my neck suddenly stood straight up and goose flesh prickled down my arms and back.  Once again, the woods fell eerily silent.  All my senses snapped to the present and I reflexively reached for my absent Beretta which I had purposely left in the car.

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