Scratch marks on tree (Newbury, New Hampshire)

I like the three patterns I see in this picture: the white scratch marks against the brown meat of the tree; the splotched pattern of the tree bark; the out-of-focus winter background. It's the background that we are always most likely to forget, isn't it?

We have been calling this, "the tree with the bear claw marks on it." But I realize that we don't really know what marked this tree. Bear? one of the wild cats that have been expanding their territory in New England? Deer or moose scratching their antlers? If anyone out there can tell what kind of marks these are, on seeing the photo, please let me know and I will forward the solution in my next posting.

I have been increasingly aware of the power of the sharing of collective knowledge. I am only 51, really not so very old, but my memory has started to show random access problems. The information is usually there, but I sometimes can't get at it -- it's like knowing I put a jar of jam of some flavor or other on a very high shelf some time back, and I know it's there but I can't see or reach it. I first noticed the change in my recall a few years ago; I was on a walk and couldn't remember the name of the hill behind the family house in New Hampshire where I have been walking for 35 year (Bly Hill). More recently, I was speaking with niece and nephew about the famous American television show on which the Beatles appeared early in their career, and couldn't remember Ed Sullivan.

I have always taken for granted a natural, easy memory for random information. What makes the change tolerable is the knowledge that there are so many ways to fill in the blanks. Sometimes it is a bit like the game "Taboo," in which you talk all around the target word until someone guesses it. Sometimes my internet-enabled smartphone serves the same purpose (searching my phone's database, or using Google or Wikipedia). On good days, this beginning of deterioriation in recall feels like a reminder of the expansive community in which I live. (On bad days, it just makes me mad.)

So the question of the scratch marks falls into a greater category of things I don't know and perhaps you do know. I await your assistance!