Tuesday, November 19, 2013

The Better Part of Valor

I am standing at a gas pump, feeding my ever hungry car, when a monstrous stereotype pulls up next to me.  It is an enormous F350 extended cab, dually pickup decked out in every kind of custom chrome polish it is possible to imagine - plus a few.  It sports Jersey plates, NRA stickers, decals of naked women and deer skulls; a full gun rack and it is towing an equally bedecked trailer loaded with the biggest 4-wheeler I have ever seen.  It too is trimmed to the nines; flaunting a custom, camouflage paint job with deer skulls interwoven amongst the mossy oak pattern - along with large, polished-chrome Playboy Bunnies on every wheel and four,  four! sets of chrome testicles hanging from it's undercarriage. 

Out of this monstrous absurdity climbs a disheveled, dirty man wearing that bizarre combination of blaze orange and camouflage.  He is reeking of booze, deer lure and extreme testosterone poisoning.  As he turns away from me, my astonished eyes are gifted with the unavoidable sight of a butt crack so blatant that it can only be partially obscured by the enormous revolver, whose weight at his hip is causing this exposure of geologic proportions.  I can clearly see that the gun is not only fully loaded, but that the hammer is cocked, ready to fire. 

As he turns towards the store, he reaches to salvage his failing garments with a firm upward hoist of his belt.  While succeeding in obscuring a portion of the unfortunate geology, this prodigious hoicking also succeeds in dislodging the loaded, cocked, unsecured cannon at his side and it clatters to the pavement.   The fact that it didn't go off can only be attributed to clear evidence that God does indeed favor fools.

I decide that my car has had enough to eat and that I would forego the cup of coffee I had been contemplating.  Sometimes, retreat really is the best option.

***

For those who wondered, the donkeys and I have not gone out walking for the past three days.  Saturday was opening day of rifle season and there is not enough orange in the world for the first few days of rifle season.  It will be very bad again Thanksgiving weekend.  For the rest of the time, we should be OK.  I hope.

I do have an orange vest for myself as well as all of the critters.  We are a very hard troupe to miss when we go trooping through the woods.  We also only go out on a trail where there are not supposed to be any hunters (although there always are).  I don't make the donkeys wear their orange in their field, but I do limit how far from the barn they can go.  I keep them close to the house during gun season, exercise be dammed.

And if any of you might be wondering, with my penchant for making up donkey conversations, that this too might be a bit of colorful fiction - sadly it's not.  My imagination is just not that good.  

I am not fond of hunting season.


21 comments:

  1. I thin you are too young to remember the situation in Maine where a woman who was standing on her own deck wearing white gloves and was shot and killed by a hunter mistaking her white gloves for the white tail of a deer. The hunter was acquitted as "anyone in Maine knows that you don't wear white gloves during deer hunting season!"

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    1. You know, I lived in Maine for a few years back in the '80s. When you mentioned that, I do remember something like that. Maine is the one place where I actually did get shot at once. I my horse had not tripped on a root at just the right moment....

      Maine was not my favorite place to live.

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  2. How revolting! Money, no brains and full of booze...what a combination to be turned loose in public with a loaded gun! I don't like the season either...Can't wait 'til it is over.

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  3. Sending good juju your way. Sad that the end of fall is so stressful… and your walks are curtailed.

    Your description of the 'hunter' is terrifying, but so well written! There must be some nice hunters out there?

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    1. There are. In fact, most of them are OK. Unfortunately, we get enough of the really bad ones to give them all a bad rap in my book.

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  4. A sight like that calls for instant action -- run for your lives! Get as far away, as fast as possible. I must say tho, you got me at the chrome testicles part. Too bad you didn't get a photo of that -- because my imagination just fails me. Rebecca2

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    1. Even if I'd had my camera, I don't think I'd have thought to use it. I was too dazzled by all that chrome:)

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  5. I do not dislike hunting season, as I love fresh Antelope or Elk. Although I will say that I am not fond of many hunters who disregard "No Hunting" signs, and continue to put others in danger.

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  6. AMEN!! Best story I've read in a while! I feel like I was there with you. I am married to a hunter and I dread deer season because of the crazy hunters in this county. My husband "still" hunts, alone. He walks into the woods and sits quietly hoping to spot a trophy buck. He says he can't shoot a doe or young deer. Hunting with dogs is allowed here..the dogs run the deer to death while the hunters sit in their muddy Toyoto trucks up and down the road ready to shoot. There is always a deer or dog getting hit by a car! Oops! Didn't mean to get carried away. You hit a nerve! :)

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  7. Oh my gosh you made me laugh! Four sets of testicles! He must have a lot to compensate for! Now, the gun, that's just sheer stupidity and totally not funny. Wow.

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  8. This is very well written. Such a great description of the hunter and his truck I felt like I was in the gas station with you. You were right to "step away." How sad the peaceful woods around your property are no longer a safe place in the fall for you and the animals. Hang on to your common sense since so few have any left these days!

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  9. Yuck! As I was reading through the description of the truck I was thinking, all this truck needs is a set of those testicles that swing from the hitch. . .and sure enough, there they were. Glad you take precautions, some hunters are not the most respectable (and there are some that do follow the regulations). I put bells on the horses and yell that we are not deer when I hear shots. Then I yell that they might as well leave cause we scared all the deer away.
    On a side note, I was walking the dogs through a metro park once and saw duck hunters right on the path. I called the office and was told they were allowed to be there, as long as they shoot towards Canada (this park was on Lake Erie/Detroit River). How could they guarantee that??

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  10. I would have made sure I turned that moron in as a DUI.

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  11. Over here the hunters are just NUTS. We were lucky a few weeks ago. We were walking the dogs ON THE ROAD when a partridge flew across just in front of us. My husband grabbed me and said "Look out!" He had caught movement up to the left - a hunter with a shotgun who let rip across our heads, towards a small caravan. They are not supposed to shoot a)towards a road b) towards people c) towards habitations. Every French word I ever knew left my brain and I screamed at him in English "You're F*ing CRAZY" He ignored me, of course.
    They have no regard for anything other than La Chasse. last winter, two mushroom pickers were killed by a 76year old hunter who mistook them for pheasants... Hello? People? Pheasants? There is quite a difference...

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  12. Apparently, upstate NY does have something in common with France after all:)

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  13. I had to come back and read your story again. You deserve some kind of an award. That is the best description of anything I've ever read!

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  14. Wow! Still gasping not just at the terrifying clarity of your description of Mr Chrome Testicles (WHAT?!) but at some of the comments...I've just realised how lucky we are here :-0

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  15. Hunting here starts Saturday morning. Morris me...and all other critters stay close to home for 9 days. I do go out and drive for hubby after the first 6 days have passed.
    The big first 4-5 days is nuts.
    I remain sequestered in the house or working.

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  16. Yegods! Very glad I live in Australia! I don't get why the 'rights' of some people who want to hunt have to come before the rights of everyone else to walk outside their front gate (or stand on their own deck) in safety.

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