Living in this part of Kentucky, you have to expect rituals and rites of passage. Moving here as an adult I was never indoctrinated in some of these but I see them all the time, raising my children on a farm. First, if a cow is out, the entire household has to get up, no matter the hour, and run! You have got to encourage that cow back in without them bolting. I can remember when we were milking cows watching our entire herd of heifers prancing down Hwy 339 like they were going on a stroll. If you were behind them you couldn’t run after them. That would just get them running. So you had to walk parallel, very fast, until you could get ahead of them and turn them back around. And if you weren’t raised on the farm you can look like a complete idiot out there. Cows have a mind of their own and it’s really hard to read.
The next is that when the corn is ready to be picked out of the garden then it has to be picked and shucked and cut off the cob right then and there. There is no waiting for the weekend or even until the next day. And the entire family has to be involved in the process. I was indoctrinated into that rite/ritual early in my marriage and dread that day every year that we grow corn.
The next though is what I really want to talk about. Deer hunting. There are many people in this area who interrupt their marriage for deer season. And it’s not just the men. There are plenty of women who get out in the cold of night to be ready to strike when the deer start moving at dawn. Personally, I never had a desire to go hunt deer. And I’m fortunate that Jimmy is not a hunter so I don’t have to worry about him being gone or bringing home things for me to cook up. I’ve eaten deer. I prefer other types of meat. So if I’m not going to eat it then I’m not going to cook it. ‘Nuf said.
That doesn’t mean that we aren’t immune to that time of year. We live on a farm that is rich in game. We have plenty of family who love to hunt so early on in our marriage we had to endure the deer hunters. They hunt with a gun, with a bow, with a muzzleloader. They just hunt. This means they can hunt from the first part of September until the middle of January. But the bulk of them hunt for about 15 days in November. This is gun season.
You always know when it’s hunting season. Everybody gets ready. They have all of their camo out. They have all of their orange out. They have every gun they own out as they have to get them cleaned and ready to go. They have their knives out so they can sharpen them in anticipation of having to skin a buck. They take about 2 weeks to get ready. And they are ready. They are out in their deer stands early on opening day and that’s when you start hearing the shots.
I don’t think we were even married a year when we came home from going out to dinner and as we drove up into our driveway our headlights shone on a deer hanging from our tree. Most of the men in our family don’t necessarily field dress a deer. They just bring it back to the farm and take care of it there. That’s all well and good but do they have to leave it hanging from the tree to scare me out of my wits. I literally screamed when I saw that deer. Another time I had to go into the garage for something and when I opened the door I came face to face with a deer hanging from the rafters. It seemed that our dog wouldn’t leave the deer alone so that brother or nephew decided to hang the deer in the garage. I would have preferred some warning.
But that’s only the beginning. With all of this activity the deer are moving. In most cases they are moving very, very, fast and really are not paying attention to where they are going. They just want to get away from the noise. So, they are crossing roads right in front of oncoming cars. Many people in our area dread to drive at dusk or dawn during this time of the year as that is when the deer are moving. And many a car will find itself in a body shop. One of the things I think is so funny is that if a car hits a buck and it has a decent rack the unfortunate driver will take that trophy. I often wonder if they are going to mount that buck or just want to keep the antlers. I would leave it. I wouldn’t want any reminder of how I got my deer.
And that’s what these guys do. They kill a deer and then they take the trophy to be mounted by a taxidermist. No telling what that costs. Then they take the deer to be processed and made into hamburger and steaks and jerky and fun sticks. They are out all kinds of money but I guess they have something to show for it. I’m just lucky that we don’t have all kinds of mounts in our living room. I have been in some houses where they could easily line every wall.
So you think that I have missed all of this? No. Three out of four of my children are hunters. My two daughters both have shotguns. I wouldn’t mess with them. But my youngest son got the hunting gene that his dad missed. That boy could hunt 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And since his father doesn’t hunt then it was up to his uncles and cousins to take him. And they did. Even though he wouldn’t sit still and he wouldn’t stay quiet. They took him every year. But last year he went on his own. I was busting his dad too. I told his dad that he needed to get up and go with that boy. That boy didn’t have any business being out in a field all alone shooting his gun. And then we heard it. We heard the shot that changed the world. And we waited. About an hour later he pulled up at the house but without any deer. I was just glad that he was in one piece.
It seems that he had seen a deer and had shot him. The deer went down. John was ecstatic. He jumped out of his box and took off after his prize. But about that time the deer got up and took off running. He was hit but he wasn’t dead. That happens sometimes. John went after him and tried to find him for about an hour and then gave up. He never found him. I thought he would be bummed but he wasn’t. He was just so appreciative that he had seen something worth shooting at and that he did it. He had to agree with his dad that he probably shouldn’t have taken off running after the deer. He wouldn’t make that mistake again.
He got up and out early the next morning. About dawn when I was getting ready to wake up I heard another shot. I sat straight up in bed. I wondered if that was him. About 30 minutes later I heard our Gator pull up and I went out to see what was going on. John had gotten a deer. It was a decent sized buck. He had shot that thing and loaded it into the Gator by himself. When he got up to the farm he and his dad went and got the rope to string him up and field dress him. They decided not to mount him so John took the rack and put it out in the barn to dry. They took the best meat and took it to be processed into jerky since that’s what they like the best.
Even though I kept saying “poor Bambi” I was so very proud of my boy. This was such a rite of passage. He had left the land of little boys and entered the land of men. He was on even ground.
This year I almost got a buck. We were on our way home from Paducah and I had to slam on my brakes to avoid the nice buck that was running across my path. I couldn’t help laughing at myself.
On opening day at the farm my nephew, Ben, got a real nice buck that most everyone in our area had been watching. This was one of those bucks of a lifetime. He rode that thing around in the back of his truck all weekend. He took it everywhere. Everyone oohed and aaahed. We all know that even though this is one of those bucks of a lifetime Ben will be back out there next year, looking for that next one. It’s what is done around here this time of the year. It’s one of the rites of passage.
This is what I am talking about. Came home from church to this in the driveway.
Love it!