I am Alice in Wonderland. It’s an inane statement, but it’s true. I’ve cracked the shell of reality, landing somewhere foreign and unknown. I’ve always attempted to chase small animals and to get lost in the simple web of suburban sidewalk. I’m infectiously curious; I’m constantly determined to explore. I can remember quite clearly the first time I broke the surface. I was in the mountains of upstate New York and still retained the neutral eyes of a child. One morning I took my basket to pick blackberries along the edges of a nearby forest, and I saw a buck standing beneath an apple tree. The breath left my lungs and in an instant I was after him, my basket thrown haphazardly onto the soil. He was a flurry of tawny whiteness, a larger-than-life sprite I was destined to catch. He wound through the foliage, bounding like the shadow of a falling leaf. I was nearly at my threshold, panting, fingers yearning to reach when…

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• Ecology