The Alabama, Hurt Shoulder, Crossbow Challenge….

There is a special relationship between each individual person and the idea of home. It’s at times a romance, where nostalgia and memories fill your heart with warm feelings of family, friends and fireplaces. It is also at times adversarial, coming to blows with the chains of who you were, and who you have tried to become and the disconnect between the two. Much like a college kid’s Facebook relationship status, it’s complicated. Those complications, however, weave an ornate tapestry that spins and threads our childhood into our adulthood. My tapestry just happens to be woven in camouflage. 

Like many kids, my father taught me how to hunt, and still is teaching me lessons today. I still call him for advice from time to time and am still excited to give him the news of what’s happening in my outdoors. He does the same, though admittedly he’s a tad more stoic. Still though, he is eager to relay news of scouting finds and hunt sightings, in his own dismissive way. So, as my lovely bride-to-be ventured off on her bachelorette party for three days and my mother goes to take care of my nephews for the weekend, the stage was neatly set for a 3-day father/son hunt on the very land on which he taught me how to hunt. 

Before I even arrived, things weren’t going according to plan. I injured my shoulder with a small hunting related mishap on Monday. By Tuesday, I couldn’t even move my left arm. Just in case anyone was wondering, it’s impossible to bow hunt when you have to grunt very loudly to move your left arm. Luckily though, I have great friends and my buddy Evan Owen lent me his crossbow so the trip could continue. My father, also with chronic shoulder issues, had recently purchased a crossbow, so it was actually panning out well. Father and son, crossbows in hand, heading out into the wilderness. Sounds like a decent Hallmark movie. I doubt I’d be able to pitch that one by the holiday season, but I’ll get back to you on the progress of the screenplay. 

As I head out on Thursday morning, after dropping my future wife at the airport with her friends, I call Dad to let him know I’m on my way. He told me that his crossbow should be delivered that afternoon, so he’ll have to stay behind today to get it set up but that all should be ready for the next two days. He tells me which way the wind is blowing and what he has been seeing as he has been starting to prep for muzzleloader season which begins in a couple of weeks. Based on that info, I head to one of my favorite food plots. It’s the field I killed my first deer on, and for a while my biggest buck came off that field as well. I’m always flooded with memories every time I hunt there. I basically grew up on this land, but so much has changed over the past several years, both to the land and myself, that I somewhat feel like a stranger there. I suppose that is what growing up is. Leaving the familiar for the unknown, until the unknown is familiar, and the familiar feels unknown. 

Whew, that was deep!  Grab a pair of floaties and reread that last sentence a couple times…

It could not have been a more cathartic and perfect first day. Just enough action to keep me entertained and looking forward to the next two days. I’m excited to see what else is to come. 

Day 2 technically started on the end of day 1. I get back to my parent’s house to discover that FedEx had not come through and my Dad was still crossbow-less. The tracking indicated it would now arrive the next day. So with that, we decide to skip the morning and wait on his new weapon. Waking the next morning with eager hopes, I caught up on some work and writing. I did a few things around the house, and constantly watched out the window for a white delivery van. 9 am faded to 10, which gave way to 11, and as each hour passes, hope dims that Dad’s crossbow will arrive. Finally, at 2 pm, we have to call it. I’ll hunt deer. He’ll scout and keep a rifle in case we run into hogs. 

I again slip into a stand engrossed in memories, and a wet summer had engrossed this blind in poison oak. Not just a little either. I mean engrossed to the point that it is growing up through the floor of the box blind. I literally have to bushwhack my way in and spend 20 minutes trying to clear it out so the windows could open. Once I accomplished that, I sat back to enjoy the day and very anxiously wait for the itching to start. 

As the time of truth all hunters know draws near, I hear a very unmistakable noise coming through the brush. It sounds like a train running on corn liquor being driven by a screaming sick cat. Yup, it’s a group of wild pigs. 

With only three bolts to my name, I decide very quickly that I can’t shoot one. I grab the phone and text my Dad to come and sneak in with the rifle. I know it seems like an odd plan of attack, but we’ve done this before with some degree of success, so I actually felt pretty confident. I kept watching the sounder and waiting, expecting a blast at any minute. I know Dad has to be close. Even from a box blind, I feel the air switch and just like that the hogs begin to scatter. Dad’s been made. He does, however, take the opportunity to throw a Hail Mary the group’s way. Yet it seems to have fallen incomplete. But fun to watch, nonetheless. Now, I have an hour of daylight to relocate and try again. 

I jump over to a field that’s fun to hunt and has visibility for days. However, it’s not conducive to hunting with a 50 yard range. Little daylight is left. I expect to just observe some deer from far off, and then try again tomorrow. However, the first three deer on the field are bucks and one is worth a second look. I get situated, and get my plan in order, for if and when he begins to move my way. 

I feel like every hunter finds himself in a situation where he’s trying to coax a deer with telepathic messages. “Come on, just a little closer… Don’t you blow… Turn deer, turn…”. Well, that was me to this buck literally for 45 minutes. Not that anyone needs my credentials as a psychic, but this encounter is proof. I have no abilities. He happily fed his head off at 110 yards away, despite his compatriot literally walking within feet of my blind. I may not be a psychic, but that buck, he knew where he was safe. Most of them do. 

We expected a box to be sitting on the front porch upon arriving home, but we were again left in disappointment. We’re getting used to it. Again, our plan is the same. Wait for FedEx in the morning and try again in the afternoon. Though at this point, we are losing faith in the delivery folks. For good reason too, it again doesn’t show. It actually moved backwards somehow. I’m not sure how the logistics of that works, but all we can do is move forward. So, we again are chasing two different quarries, with two different weapons. My, not so close, close encounter has got my hunger high. I want one with this dang crossbow! I choose my spot, and head off hopeful.

There are challenges I never considered that come with crossbow hunting. I fancy myself somewhat of a proficient archer with a compound. My effective range is about 50 yards, and there isn’t really an increase in that with the crossbow. They still must be close. Crossbows are also sneakily bulky and hard to maneuver. If you have a blind with narrow windows, with a large height crossbow from scope to stock, you could have difficulty aiming. If you aren’t wildly careful to make sure your limbs have room to flex without hitting anything, and that the bolt is clear all the way through its arc, you too could have a story that ends like this. 

As the magic hour is hitting its peak, finally the first deer begin to file onto the field. It has been a steady and heavy mist all afternoon, leaving an eerie haze over the landscape. The two large does and what seemed to be a late dropped fawn make a straight dash to immediately in front of my blind. As I watch, hoping they will give away the approach of more deer, it happens. A stick snaps in the woods to the right, and every set of eyes, including mine, whip around to see what was making an entrance. Slowly a buck begins to make his way onto the field and towards the rest of the deer. He’s a small 8-point buck. If I had been holding a rifle, I would most probably let this deer meander his way off into oblivion. Holding the crossbow, I was geared up too high to not try. Let’s make this work. 

All the challenges I mentioned came into play at this moment. He needed to be within 50 yards, check. However, the windows of this blind were particularly narrow. The buck was also far to the left, meaning I had to make sure my limbs didn’t whack the sides of the window frames. The windows were also narrow vertically, so now I’m trying to get enough out the window to make sure the arrow doesn’t clip. Trying to complete all these steps with a very unwilling partner made for a 30-minute dance off that was one of the more stressful hunting situations I have ever had. It didn’t seem perfect. It wasn’t really comfortable, but it was last call. Darkness was almost on top of me, and it was my last hunt day. It was shoot now, or forever hold your peace. I got everything the best I could and took aim. THWACK!  The lighted nock told the whole story very quickly and very painfully. I thought I had done enough, but the bolt nicked the bottom window frame, and ricocheted off into the night finding a resting place in a tree trunk about 35 feet high. 

The strangest part of the whole exchange was my lack of disappointment. I had come home to hunt with my dad for three days, had tons of excitement, and got a shot off on a good buck with a weapon I’d never even taken in the woods before. Of course, ending this story with a grip and grin photo would have been a good ending, but the lesson I was to learn wouldn’t have been hammered home. Your friend was generous when you got hurt, you have great places to pursue your passion all over, and you are still able to do it all with your father. So many people would kill to be so lucky. Gratitude for what is given is the lesson here. Not humility, preparation, or safety. I was given an amazing hunt and didn’t need anything else. That’s how I felt hiking through the mist back to the truck, and that’s how I feel now writing about it. Grateful.