Day 12--The Hunt

Though my great grandpa wasn't a very successful farmer, he was quite the hunter. He was usually able to bring home enough meat from various hunting trips to keep his family well fed when he needed to cover a gap left from what the farm should have yielded. However, one particular September was just about to come to a close, and he had yet to shoot his deer for the season. It was the last day of deer-hunting season, and Great Grandpa was confident he would get his buck to shoot and bring it home triumphantly. It came to the end of the day, and he hadn't had any luck. He'd been close to a kill a few times, but he couldn't seal the deal. He was out of bullets, out of time, and out of luck.

"What a day," he thought in complete disappointment. "How can I hold my head up when I go home and tell my family that I didn't shoot a thing?"

He started to gather his belongings and make his way back to his old farm house, trying to gather his thoughts for an explanation to give his family of the sort of trouble he'd had. Just then, Great Grandpa caught sight of a young buck, so young it didn't even boast a rack yet, in his path. He deeply regretted some of the careless shots he'd taken that day as he was now close enough to this buck there was little doubt he'd miss. He felt he had to do something. He looked and looked around his path. Maybe there was a spare bullet he'd mistakenly dropped on the ground or a rock small enough he could stuff it in and use it as ammunition. Eventually, he found something that he thought would do the trick.

"Choke cherries," he thought to himself. He was a desperate man, and he was willing to try anything. He picked up one that he thought would do and stuffed it in the chamber. He raised his gun and took aim. "Here goes nothing," he mumbled as he pulled the trigger.

The choke cherry met its mark, striking the buck right between the eyes. The buck staggered and looked stunned, but it snapped into motion and sprinted out of sight as soon as its wits came back. Great grandpa hung his head in defeat and made his way home in a shroud of deerless shame.

* * *

Time passed and before Great Grandpa knew it, he was standing in the same pasture in the dead center of the next deer season. Today, he was prepared, and he felt confident he'd make up for his dismal showing last year. He remembered the choke cherry incident and flushed in embarrassment. "What a fool I was to even try such a stunt! What did I expect to happen?" He tried to shake free from the memory and make the best of today's hunt. He began still hunting, keeping his ears perked for any unsuspecting prey that could catch his line of vision. It wasn't long until he found himself in the presence of a deer who looked like a prime candidate. Great Grandpa stopped in his tracks and raised his binoculars to get a clear view of the specimen.

"I'llbe darned," Great Grandpa said as he made his observation. He was standing in the very presence of the buck he'd gotten between the eyes last season. "That's the one," he muttered, "I'll be . . ." And there really wasn't any doubt that this was the deer of the season before, for there in the binoculars, plain as day, Great Grandpa could see a not-so-young buck with a choke cherry tree growing right between its eyes!

* This is a bit of a family legend, and I'm not sure that it's unique to my family, but my Grandpa Pat told me that his father told him this story when he was a kid, and then Pa Pat told it to my brother and me. Beck's going to need to hear it eventually, and I hope he doesn't know enough about hunting to be too mindful of the loose facts.

Today's Task was to tell a lie!