I may have grown up in a little redneck town, but somehow I never went hunting. My dad came from the big city, and while he did absorb some small town culture, driving a pickup truck, learning how to run a chainsaw, and getting a dog, he never owned a gun. I got a pellet gun for Christmas one year and it has claimed a couple crows and squirrels, but always only from the porch. I wasn't allowed to take it with me in the woods. I might've shot my eye out.
A few years ago, a friend and co-worker offered to take me along hunting. He was going for black bear and I was welcome to tag along. Of course I agreed, so that Saturday we headed out early. We drove around on backroads and overgrown paths in his 4X4 for most of the day, stopping a couple times to hike through promising country. I'm accustomed to hiking, but this was different. If things went according to plan, we didn't want to have to carry a carcass too far back to the truck. It was a sunny spring day, so there was only snow where the avalanches of winter had piled it up extra deep and packed it tight.
We had seen bear sign (poop) all day, and plenty of deer all day. It was getting into the afternoon and we had just decided to call it a day when Marc suddenly hit the brakes and killed the engine. Way up the open hillside on our left was a black bear foraging for dinner. If she knew we were there, she wasn't bothered by us. Marc grabbed his rifle from the back seat, slid in the bolt and a shell, and lay down on the side of the road. I stood there not quite sure what to do, but completely excited. I'm normally pretty level, but watching him aim a lethal weapon at this living creature overloaded my calm little brain completely. It was all I could do to keep from dancing from excitement.
Marc had been hunting since childhood. He saw every animal that day before I did, and tried pointing out some I never did find. His guns were a mix of quality inherited pieces and quality stuff he had bought for himself. He took better care of his hunting gear than he did of anything else he had. He was also a dead shot. So, in my mind, as he lay there lining up a difficult long shot up a steep hill, I had no doubt that he would make it. He didn't disappoint. The bear made one mad dash in a small circle and fell still before the echo of the shot was over. I found myself arguing internally about whether or not it was okay to be so excited about what we were doing.
The bear was kind of small, but that is the risk you take with hunting for black bear. They don't change proportion noticeably from young adult to senior, especially from a distance. We skinned and cleaned it and slid it into a special sleeve to keep it fresh until we could get to the butcher. Apparently bears are lousy eating as steaks or roasts, but they make a wicked sausage. The pepperoni was as good as any I've ever had.
I haven't hunted again since that day. I enjoyed myself and would go again, but I was also shocked and even a bit embarrassed at how exciting it was. There is a primal part of our brains that has learned over thousands of generations that killing an animal is a really good thing because it means survival of the self. My primal brain had been dormant until that day, but I'm glad to know it is still there. Spring is coming, maybe I'll get back out there this year.
Showing posts with label defining moments. Show all posts
Showing posts with label defining moments. Show all posts
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Friday, January 18, 2013
Carving
They had a small table set up at the big show. No fancy computer aided laser guided state of the art machines programmed offsite to be set loose on unmanned warehouses of lumber. Just a club of craftsmen each with one small knife and a piece of wood. They weren't carving figurines or making signs, they were making cuts in geometric patterns on wooden surfaces. It was delicate work, time-consuming, and fussy. There appeared to be no function, only form. I was smitten.
That Christmas my in-laws, who had been at the wood show with me, gave me a good geometry kit and my very own chip carving knife. I took out a book from the library, scrounged an old scrap piece of wood and started in. I quickly ended up with a dull knife and a frustratingly poor result. I put my kit aside, returned the book, and left it for what turned into years. I never did check out the club's meetings.
Years after putting it aside, I must have found my knife again and commented on it, because my lovely wife went out a bought me a new book on learning to carve. Either that first book from the library was written by someone who had never actually carved a thing in their life, or I had been misinterpreting the directions badly. I choose to believe it was the author's fault, never mind what they say about lousy carpenters. Anyway, with the new book, a new sharpening stone, and a block of proper wood, I was off to the races. Turns out it wasn't nearly so hard as I thought. Partly because of the book, partly because of the wood, partly because I could keep my knife sharp, I was quickly carving consistent lines of practice shapes.
For what came next, I blame my mother. When she starts a new thing, she doesn't start small and work her way up. She's barely grasped the basics and she's off tackling as big a project as she can think of. Her first quilt was made of denim and big enough to cover a queen-sized bed. I don't sew, but when I mention it, quilters say both the material and the size are quite difficult. I guess her idea is to make the learning curve as steep as possible, and by the end of the project, she's really good. It seems to work, because she's amazing. So, as I was getting bored of repeating lines of practice and starting to look for a project, it was ingrained in me to look for something big. The ideas in the book were unappealing, like scroll-saw patterns from the 90's. Flowers, horses, and family names on tissue boxes was not going to cut it. Sorry, that was lame. Anyway, I decided I would build a humidor for my father. While I was at it, I would build one for my father-in-law. That bit of sound reasoning comes from my father: Making two is barely harder than making one. Right.
I had practiced enough to produce a few good, consistent shapes. I had not practiced box-building at all. Ever. I have a bit of wood-working experience, but it was still the weak point in my plan. Hobbies are like renovations that way. You start one thing and it snowballs. But, I had my idea, so I ordered wood online, basswood for the carving and Spanish cedar for the lining. Another thing I had never practiced was creating and laying out a custom design. As it turns out, this is even more time-consuming than box building. At least the way I build boxes. I figure those cigar boxes together took between 150 and 200 hours to complete between building, designing, drawing, and carving.
Mom's method works. Bite off more than it looks like you should be able to chew, and if you manage it, your skills are way better than they would have been if you tried to slowly build. Of course, it could backfire, and you give up before you level up, but this past year I made a far more complex project, carving-wise, in less than half the time of one box. I'm still a beginner, as a quick Google Images search for "chip carving" will show, but I'm getting better all the time. My idea of a big project is changing too. Good thing wood is cheap.
It's funny how you can stumble on something that becomes such a big deal in your life. I was going along just fine without even knowing what chip carving was, and now I spend several hours per week on it. Thousands of people walked by that booth without more than a glance. Even if they stopped to check it out, most didn't ever try it. I walked by hundreds of other booths that day that didn't grab me. I wonder how many of these chance moments come to define who we become in the end. Who we meet, where we go, how much of it was just an accident that almost didn't even happen?
That Christmas my in-laws, who had been at the wood show with me, gave me a good geometry kit and my very own chip carving knife. I took out a book from the library, scrounged an old scrap piece of wood and started in. I quickly ended up with a dull knife and a frustratingly poor result. I put my kit aside, returned the book, and left it for what turned into years. I never did check out the club's meetings.
Years after putting it aside, I must have found my knife again and commented on it, because my lovely wife went out a bought me a new book on learning to carve. Either that first book from the library was written by someone who had never actually carved a thing in their life, or I had been misinterpreting the directions badly. I choose to believe it was the author's fault, never mind what they say about lousy carpenters. Anyway, with the new book, a new sharpening stone, and a block of proper wood, I was off to the races. Turns out it wasn't nearly so hard as I thought. Partly because of the book, partly because of the wood, partly because I could keep my knife sharp, I was quickly carving consistent lines of practice shapes.
For what came next, I blame my mother. When she starts a new thing, she doesn't start small and work her way up. She's barely grasped the basics and she's off tackling as big a project as she can think of. Her first quilt was made of denim and big enough to cover a queen-sized bed. I don't sew, but when I mention it, quilters say both the material and the size are quite difficult. I guess her idea is to make the learning curve as steep as possible, and by the end of the project, she's really good. It seems to work, because she's amazing. So, as I was getting bored of repeating lines of practice and starting to look for a project, it was ingrained in me to look for something big. The ideas in the book were unappealing, like scroll-saw patterns from the 90's. Flowers, horses, and family names on tissue boxes was not going to cut it. Sorry, that was lame. Anyway, I decided I would build a humidor for my father. While I was at it, I would build one for my father-in-law. That bit of sound reasoning comes from my father: Making two is barely harder than making one. Right.
I had practiced enough to produce a few good, consistent shapes. I had not practiced box-building at all. Ever. I have a bit of wood-working experience, but it was still the weak point in my plan. Hobbies are like renovations that way. You start one thing and it snowballs. But, I had my idea, so I ordered wood online, basswood for the carving and Spanish cedar for the lining. Another thing I had never practiced was creating and laying out a custom design. As it turns out, this is even more time-consuming than box building. At least the way I build boxes. I figure those cigar boxes together took between 150 and 200 hours to complete between building, designing, drawing, and carving.
Mom's method works. Bite off more than it looks like you should be able to chew, and if you manage it, your skills are way better than they would have been if you tried to slowly build. Of course, it could backfire, and you give up before you level up, but this past year I made a far more complex project, carving-wise, in less than half the time of one box. I'm still a beginner, as a quick Google Images search for "chip carving" will show, but I'm getting better all the time. My idea of a big project is changing too. Good thing wood is cheap.
It's funny how you can stumble on something that becomes such a big deal in your life. I was going along just fine without even knowing what chip carving was, and now I spend several hours per week on it. Thousands of people walked by that booth without more than a glance. Even if they stopped to check it out, most didn't ever try it. I walked by hundreds of other booths that day that didn't grab me. I wonder how many of these chance moments come to define who we become in the end. Who we meet, where we go, how much of it was just an accident that almost didn't even happen?
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