Agendas

"What's the gun range?"

"It's where you go to shoot guns. Wanna go?" It was a longshot but worth the ask given the difficulty in throwing clay targets to yourself.

"Mmmm...okay." Score.

Excessive misses during the season suggested a change of routine during the down months. Don't call it a New Year's Resolution, more of a commitment to make an attempt to get a little better. After skipping March, April and most of May for no good reason it was time to at least make the effort.

The effort was a bit unorthodox. He's not quite big enough to cock the thrower, at least not without risk of it springing back and cracking a wrist or taking out his lower set of teeth. So the routine went something like cock, "okay put a target in", "keep your hand off the lever", "I said keep your hand off the lever", walk 15 yards off to the side, shoot, walk back to thrower, repeat.

Truth be told it was probably better practice than round after round after round from an electronic thrower on the skeet range, the philosophy being that birds typically don't come floating into the field on command at precisely spaced intervals in places outside of Argentina.

He would've stayed all day. At that age there must be some never-experienced feeling of power at heaving a disc 75 yards through the air with barely the touch of a finger. He's really in a for a treat when he gets to turn that disc to powder with the same finger.

Better still from the shooter's perspective, every time a target broke he clapped. Not out of sarcasm, not because someone told him to, just untainted sincerity. A fan club of one is all you really need.

Two guys from the same gene pool, one living purely in the moment, the other leveraging the moment on a practical basis for what's behind door #3, but starting to wonder if he didn't already get the prize.

And this is quail hunting (spoiler alert: it's not what you think)

With a twitch of anger and long exhale of resignation I received the news last Saturday evening that my wife had to work on Sunday.  Nothing I could do about this but modify my plans. A week into quail season and I hadn't been yet and Sunday was going to be my day, only now I would be taking both kids along with me.

Waist-high kids don't move easily through waist-high weeds, nor do they shrug off briars as part of the deal, so my plan was to stick to the roads as much as possible. These are forestry service roads, crusher run base, maintained pretty well and scattered, smothered, covered and chunked in small rocks. Not 100 yards in I turn around to check on my companions and see four tiny hands full of stones.

Me: "What are you going to do with all of those rocks?"
Both kids: "I don't know."
"They're gonna get heavy.  You might want to set them down here and pick them up on the way back."
"No thanks." At least our efforts at manners are showing progress.

Another 50 yards I turn again. Coat pockets now full, cradled arms are filling up.  And then other places.

"Did you put rocks in your underwear?"
"No."
"Then what are all of those lumps in your pants?"
"Nothing." Later decrypted, I discovered that nothing is code for rocks.

At the end of the road lies a river, a welcome break from the monotony of walking and finding no birds. And a brainstorm...
"Why don't you throw those rocks into the water?"
Glance at each other followed by a fusillade of granite.

Deer sign is a wonderful diversion from boredom, if only for a while. As are trees that have been struck by lightning, areas that have been burned, flattened soda cans, and noises in the grass. On our way back to the truck my son heard rustling in the weeds next to the road.

"Dad, what's that?"
"I don't know, what do you think it is?"
"A bear."
"Can you handle him if he jumps out at us?"
Long silence.  "If he jumps out at us I'll hit him with this stick and poke it down his mouth and push him over backwards and then you can shoot him and then we can take him home and eat him for supper."
"Sounds like a plan, pal."

I don't know what it is about sticks and rocks but it's impossible for kids to walk in the woods without picking up one or both. I do know that I have a growing collection of both in the back of my truck. My son informed me that he was going to take the bear-killing stick home and paint it red, like blood. When we got home, and I'm guessing here, he discovered a rock in his pocket, forgot about the stick, and painted the rock red with a magic marker. In the process he painted his hands red and grew a red beard on slightly more than half of his face.

Yes, this was a quail hunting trip.

When life gives you lemons you realize there are some things you can control, some things you can't, and some things you just shouldn't.

Dove hunting is....

.....altogether different when you're four years old.

the bribe

fieldcraft...

...courtesy of a patient friend

wanted to know if he could sleep with it

There are far too many days when I wish I were a kid again.

Giving Thanks

With the exception of the occasional Monday most of us don't have to look too hard to find a few things to be thankful for.  The challenge is keeping the frustrations and inconveniences of everyday life in perspective so that all the good can rise to the top.  While membership in the Forbes 400 continues to elude me (and likely will until the Sun burns out), on a globally relative basis I am wealthy beyond belief.  I have food on the table and a roof over my head and a job that pays.  I have what I need even though sometimes I have to remind myself of it.  Truth be told I have more than I need...

...a couple of great kids, one of whom is showing promise as a hunting partner.  Few things make a bad day disappear more quickly.

...a wife who is generally gracious about indulging my outdoor obsessions (during hunting season anyway).  For any of you never-been-married guys out there trust me, this one alone is something of value.  I've seen the other side and it ain't pretty.


...a bird dog who has filled the hole left by my last one, right down to being a constant, devoted companion.  You're never alone with one of these.

...places to hunt that fit my frugal nature.  When I think of the people in other countries who come up short on this end, I realize how fortunate we are in this great land, government aside. And while we're on the subject, I'm extremely grateful my business card doesn't say 'Senator' anywhere on it.

...the good health and physical capacity to get outside and walk, and the inclination to do so.  If I have a nagging fear it's that I'll someday lose the desire or ability to pursue my diversions.

No one, not even those in the Forbes 400, is guaranteed an endless string of perfect days.  We all have good days and better days and now and then a downright crappy day.  The latter usually pass pretty quickly when a shade of perspective intervenes.  Honestly, every day should be an occasion to give thanks.

As days go, this was a pretty good one

Any time you get a sub-70 degree day in September (in South Carolina) it's hard to complain.  If you can spend in it a dove field, all the better.  This is almost like getting a foot of snow in these parts and we took full advantage.  Beautiful day to be outside.

Oh, and there was this:

He's two months shy of his fourth birthday and this was his first hunt.  No, he didn't shoot it.  That gun is a Daisy that doesn't load, just cocks and kicks and makes a pop.  But he went after it like he did, complete with the universal kids arm-extended-tip-of-the-wing hold.  I showed him how to fold the wings against the body and carry it and he was fine with that right up until the next bird went down.  Then it was back to the wing tip.  A couple of them got poked with the butt of his gun. Kids are funny.

I'll admit I was a bit worried how he would handle the noise given his aversion to vacuum cleaners and lawnmowers and the like.  A pair of orange ("No! Not the yellow ones, Dad") plugs coaxed into those tiny ears and he never flinched. Small victories.

There's a lot that can go wrong in a kid's lifetime.  As a parent you do everything you can to put the odds in their favor, but there's still so much beyond your control.  I know how I'd like him to turn out.  I'd like to be sitting in a field forty years from now watching him watch his son do the same thing, but there are no guarantees.  So you take days like today and enjoy the hell out of them.