The Curtain Falls
Jan 28th, 2008 | By Hank Shaw | Category: Hunting & Fishing Stories, Wild Game | Comments | 9 Comments |
It’s over.
After three months of waking up when once I went to bed, three months of gagging down bowls of cereal when all my body wanted was sleep, sipping black coffee on a foggy highway as we hurtled north, all the while feeling slightly nauseous, hunting season has ended.
Three months’ worth of aching legs and slogs through knee-deep water over slick, slimy bottom, setting out plastic decoys in just the right pattern - then the endless fretting over whether I’d placed them correctly – they’re all over now.
Three months of chilled fingers and sodden feet and always the watchful waiting: Is that a duck? The electric anticipation when the birds circle closer, when they cup their wings and literally fall from the windswept sky into our pond – our pond, not someone else’s! Three months of literally vibrating in the expectation that oh yes oh yes oh yes they are here, the ducks have come to us!
Three months of that moment when Time slows and the Eternal opens. You see the bird, clear as day, clear as the sunlit morning after the storm, clear as anything has ever been in this world or will be in the next. And in that instant you know that bird will be yours. This is what the grizzly sees when the deer stumbles. Without conscious thought you’ve slapped the trigger on your shotgun. Once. Twice. The bird falls. The world ends.
And with that splash as the bird hits the water Time returns, and this time with a ferocity that seizes you and hurls you from your marshy blind and after that which you have plucked from the sky. Fear scratches the back of your mind as you slog hopelessly slow toward the fallen bird, hoping hoping hoping it will not stir. But a bird’s will to survive is strong, and even though your survival does not depend on catching this bird, the Chase consumes you as if it did.
And then at last you plunge your hand into the sullen water and grab what you have taken from Nature. The bird is yours! You will eat meat today.
But it is over now. Over for nine long months. Guns will be oiled, gear packed in closets and decoys returned to the outside shed to slumber for nine long months. Out in the marsh the ducks are flying, pairing up and thinking about nesting in a spring that already stirs within the emerald world of California in winter. In time, those birds will fly north with their young, only to return to the marsh as the leaves fall.
I will be there.
Nice piece of writing! Aren’t you supposed to have a dog to go slogging in the muck to bring back the prize?? You could name him “Schkaadole” hehe
The -35 morning I woke up to is far away from the end of my hunting season, which was back in early November.
I really do appreciate how seasonal it is – there’s a time and place for it, and when those things come, it is indeed a satisfying thing.
Nicely written, Hank.
Yeah, it’s months to go before you sleep (or don’t sleep… it’s tough to work Bob Frost into this one)… but plenty to occupy the time between.
If you think it’s awesome to watch the birds lock up and soar in, try the experience of calling turkeys.
Listen unmoving, as the gobbles draw closer, ghosting through the woods until the red head appears, bobbing just out of range… searching that most dangerous quarry… the sultry harridan who’s making that seductive cluck and purr. Oh yeah… now that’ll make your heart beat.
Hank,
Great post, a pleasure to read. I have just had to change my menus, saying goodbye to serving woodcock and partridge until the autumn. As much as I look forward to the warmer days I still miss cooking those great game birds.
Beautifully written, Hank. Between your words and my nephew’s photography (ErikT@smugmug.com), I may, someday, understand the deep depression that overwhelms my brother at this time of the year. Thanks.
very good piece, keep up the excellent writing.
As an avid duck hunter, I could not find better words to express my after season feelings. Nice job giving a personal perspective on the passion that consumes all true waterfowlers.
100,000 thank-yous, all! This was one of those pieces that just throttles you as you write it – the words all came out in a flush at first, then all you need to do is tinker with it for a while. I’d been thinking about it all day in Sunday while I was searching for birds in the sky…
I was with James from sporting shooter last weekend and his dad was deifying our national stereotype by saying ‘I’ll be a relief not to think about the weather’
SBW