The Mighty Hunter?

It’s a beautiful day here on the North Coast. Temperature was about 20 at 9:00 when I took off for a ski. Nice, easy outing today. The snow was hard and fast but tough to edge on. I followed an unbroken trail at the Carlyle Reservation that goes out around a duck pond. In the woods I flushed out some white tail deer. Probably about 7 of them. I veered off the trail and followed where the had come from.  I found where they had bedded down. they had also been pawing the snow to expose the grass for food.

As I was tracking them my mind wandered back to a childhood experience when I shot a bird with a BB gun. I can’t remember where the gun came from. Given our economic status it was probably a used one my parents got for us kids to share. I went to a nearby wooded area to find something to shoot. Across the field there was a flock of small birds. I don’t recall what kind but they were about the size of a finch. I took careful aim at one of them thinking that there was no way I could hit him. To my surprise I did. The bird immediately took off, weakened, for another tree. He was a little closer to me but still far enough away that I didn’t feel bad taking aim. I couldn’t really see his face. I hit him again and he took off but he was not able to maintain altitude. He landed on the ground at the base of a big tree. I walked up to him and looked at him for a long time. I remember seeing the fast breathing and thinking how scared he must be. He was so small and helpless and I had all the power.  I honestly don’t remember if I just went home or shot him again. I’d like to think the former. The experience really bothered me but I never shared the thoughts with anyone until after I got married. Growing up in a household of 8 boys with a macho hunting father sharing "feelings" was not done very often. I probably just bragged that I shot a bird.  

My father was a hunter like all his friends. He always tried to introduce us boys to the "sport". I did shoot a rabbit with him one time and my oldest brother shot a deer when he was 12. My brother-in-law still hunts on the family land and shot a deer last year. The older I get the more barbaric it looks to me. I’m not a vegetarian now but I was for 2 1/2 years. My motiation was primarily for health reasons followed by environmment concerns and lastly by animal cruelty issues.  I gave up the vegetarian practice because I got tired of my restaurant choices of salads or pasta alfredo where the only calories were from fat.  Now I eat mostly small portions of meat. I do occasionally get into a big steak and it does taste good. Old habits are hard to break. Meat is still heavily subsidized by the government and relatively cheap. Until the price truly reflects the cost or I have to kill my own I’ll have a hard time giving it up totally. Diane and I took another small step last year when we agreed to not bring any more pork into the house. It’s a start.  

Namaste