HOW SHALL WE FIGHT THIS JANUARY'S WOLVES?

The January moon is the Wolf Moon, that dreaded harbinger of cold, hard, scary times, and it comes, this January, crescent new on the fifteenth. Note the date!

Seems as if the moon is having a lot of influence over our lives this winter. Last month it was to be partially responsible for a Big Earthquake. The 50-50 chanced quake didn't come, but a lot of people worried when the moon came into its full state which it did twice, highly unusual. A double whammy. This month we worry about things far more sharp-fanged than the wolves.

The Wolf Moon was so named by the Indians. They heard the hungry packs howling in the winter valleys or along the mountain slopes and knew they were eager for any food they could find, even then. No doubt they kept the fires burning brightly around the tepees of their camps.

The Wolf Moon of my youth kept me alert and fast footed when attending after-dark chores. It was my responsibility to see that the smokehouse door was locked and the chicken house door closed. These chores could both be done at twilight before the wolves began to howl, but sometimes I forgot and had to go after dark, else I would be called before Mom and Dad for lack of accountability.

Wolves? Packs of wolves in Missouri? Not really, but Grandpa, in order to bring a little drama into our winter lives, would take Lou and me outside on a January night when the Wolf Moon shed its cold light over the whitened countryside, motion toward Simms Mountain and say, "Wolves. Hear 'em?"

They sounded a bit like Jim Harris's foxhounds baying at the moon but life would have been bleak if we didn't go along with Grandpa's big-eyed, if tongue-in-cheek, suggestions. So we would run back into the house to tell the others, "We heard 'em. Six of 'em. Right up there on the side of Simms, coming this way too!" To enhance the drama or deepen the security we felt in our home, Dad would check the door latch and put another log on the fireplace fire.

Before we put a padlock on the smokehouse door, many railroad bums, seeing our evening lamp light across the meadow, no doubt waited until it went out then made their stealthy way across the field to the smokehouse. Sometimes, deeming a whole ham or shoulder too heavy to carry, they actually had the nerve to cut off big hunks of them and carry them off, silently as any midnight ghost.

Going after dark to slam the metal hasp in place, hook the U of the padlock in the staple on the smokehouse door could all be done very quickly. If there were any wolves prowling around, I felt I could make it back into the house before being mauled to bloody shreds. Grandpa's nearby penned foxhounds would make a terrible racket and bring someone out to see what was going on.

The chicken house was a more monumental after-dark challenge. On such a Wolf Moon night it seemed a mile away from the house and Jim Harris's hounds quickly became hungry wolves bounding across the meadow. It helped me develop what I call the Wolf Moon Run. This Run is characterized by not letting your feet touch the ground often and keeping them as high and as long in the air as you can, somewhat like a football player approaching the goal line with a pursuer at his heels.

Would that our January Nineties "wolves" were as innocent. But the ones we worry about this moon are made of sharp-fanged metal, explosives, chemicals, sandstorms and eye-plucking savagery. There's no just closing the door and putting another log on the fire.

There is accountability. If I had been lax in my menial responsibilities letting the bums steal our cured hams and shoulders and foxes get the chickens it would have been a hungry winter for us. Whatever role we have voluntarily taken on to fight this winter's "wolves" we must fill the niche or be called before our conscience.

Maybe your role is to argue that lazy bums, wolves and foxes have to eat too. O.K. Fulfill. Devil's advocates, whether assigned or sincere, have their role, if only to bring the whole picture into clearer focus.

REJOICE!