Iguassu Falls

Iguassu Falls

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Thursday, November 28, 2013

A Course In Adversity



Remember this: If a buck was a man going into a bar to pick up a woman, you can be certain he will not stay if there are no women to be had; especially during breeding season, twiddling his horns in the wood. This is a tale of dishonorable men.

What you are about to read is a real but terrible situation. 
The following story is a working example of how men do not want a female hunting especially if there is a buck lurking on the fringes. Hyper vigilant hunters can rob a mother from putting food on the table because after all it’s a competition. Right?

I will admit now that my hunting life when men are involved is a wretched nightmare. I beg the question: Is blood really thicker than water?

I recently took a walk and was stopped on a road by a registered sex offender that lives in the area. Nameless man inquired if I was still hunting in the same area. His next question as he looked away from my face down the road with a laugh was, “Or have you quit?”
Being suspicious that this wasn’t your average questionnaire by a jailbird I looked at him repugnantly but then decided to see where this interrogation leads. I told him I was not because I was having problems utilizing my arms. As far as my handicap, I was not able to hold up things which made me suspect I had injured my neck or had tennis elbow in both arms. I wasn’t sure so I went to a neurologist. Back to the Nameless Man.
The thought also crossed my mind that he might be trying to gauge my whereabouts for nefarious reasons. His relatives have been known to trespass with a four wheeler and steal bagged corn on a lie.  Nameless man spoke an informed me there was a mystery person living behind the hunting area that would shoot anything walking even the babies. This bird was singing if you get my drift. I told him I wondered about this because of the dead deer that where lying around. I guess he thought I was wantonly shooting them but I told him no I had an alibi. Not that the information stream couldn’t get worse but Nameless man informs me that I have a secret admirer hiding out in the woods near my deer stand. He never divulged who this culprit was. I said to Nameless man, “He’s not going to have much to admire.” Nameless man could have been joking but that would explain the Cigarette Smoking Apparition I have seen on two occasions.
Mind you there is another drama playing itself out parallel to this with another man aka the Doe Killer, who is squatting the stand I was using. This is the man that likes to kill deer and pretend they are women but he is an awful shade tree mechanic that will tear up as much or more than he fixes. My dad offered it to him in lieu of friendship so now I am insulted not once but twice by three different people; my father included. This is the second year my father has put a man right on top of me to hunt without warning me or scheduling times so people do not get shot, injured, or insulted. I feel like I am being set up for a fight with a grown man. Who does that? My father always tried to treat me like a boy when it was convenient.
Not that this sordid story could get any worse as I thought of the Bachmann debacle  but Nameless man also informed me that there was two other men in stands across the woods. I have no problem with this because they have that right but one of them has a long standing hate for me circa one of my high school girlfriends because he thinks I kept them apart when the girl lied to him and placed the blame on me. He has carried this grudge. He doesn’t know this yet of all the places he is in the woods near where I am. It could be coincidence so I gave it the benefit of the doubt. Doubt being the key word here.
Someone else was driving by my house and looking to see where I park my vehicle. The men were doing the same thing when I was at my father’s working on my chicken pen. Unknown neighbor pulled the chainsaws out about time to stand-up.  If they thought I was in the woods these persons would go out and crank the red tractor then do doughnuts a stone’s throw under the stand where I was hunting. I have seen them do it. It was like the small area was converged with men all trying to shoot the same animal. With all the activity they had chased the doe up to the main road without realizing it. If I were a deer in those woods I would have fostered a form of Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome. The hyper vigilance alone wore the deer down and ran then off. It was also grating on my last raw nerve.
I golf carted the woods one evening and realized that there was a deep sense of abandonment. As a cohesive living thing the internal feeling made me angry and sad simultaneously. I could feel that the herd was either all dead or gone. These feeling were compounded by the sight every evening of buzzards flying over the place. It really made me sick and disappointed that people could act in such a dishonorable way.
One evening I crawled up in the deer stand and there was a snake staring me in my face. I removed it and then sat in the stand. The Great Cosmos sends you messages sometimes and the only thing I could think was there were snakes in the Garden of Eden. That is what popped in my mind. I then thought of the old hoodoo superstition that when you have a snake cross your path you have someone that is trying to do you harm in secret. I finally sat in that stand and came to the realization the culprit was none other than my own father.

This is a short conversation between a female, the Doe Killer, and male 2.

Doe Killer: I have shot four doe at my house.

Female: Good for you. I haven’t shot any.  I haven’t seen anything but little doe. (I guess killing everything over there made male 2's place right pickings for him because greed and spite will do that to you.)

Male 2 and Doe Killer: Just shoot them.

Female: How can I shoot a deer if they have all been mowed down by you two and there is nothing left?

Doe Killer: I shot one off your stand.

Female: That is not my stand.

Doe Killer to male 2: That isn’t her stand? (Realizes this asshole was doing it to spite me).

Male 2: Stares blankly at TV. (Knows he helped put this asshole up to spiting me.)

Female: If you killed something back there what did you do with the meat?

Male 2: I gave it to Doe Killer. He gave it to someone else.

Female: So you mean to tell me you two have killed all the deer off. I have a child to feed and you begrudge me just one. How am I supposed to feed my child? I know you (father) said you’d rather go out and buy steak but I don’t have that money lying around. It must be nice to do that. You’re willing to starve your daughter and grandchild?

~Sound of crickets~

Female: Male 2, if you two were going to a bar would you want to stay if it were only men?

Male 2 and Doe Killer: *Laughing* No.

Female: Why do you think a buck would stay if you shoot off all the doe? The rut starts this month.

Doe Killer and Male 2 were discussing building a stand with a heater but Doe Killer said, “Why would you do that because she’s just going to go get in it?” I took this as an affront because I shouldn’t have to ask to get in any stand onMale 2's property or begrudged using it. Yet here this stranger was inciting thoughts against me in Male 2's own house. Who does that? I was totally disgusted and felt it was highly disrespectful to me and Male 2. I felt he was thinking he was entitled. For that behavior I don’t know a man worth his salt that would let some person like that throw his weight around without checking him out at the door or the floor. He’d be the kind to try to steal your wife, your life, and then laugh at you.

I got up and walked outside. A few minutes later Doe Killer followed me but I cranked the truck and left. I was finished with that business. He had already sealed his fate with me as far as I was concerned.

I realized after this conversation how all my suspicions became a truth.  A truth I couldn’t deny anymore…….

My dad saw two buck walking over the place in September. I think this was when the evil bug of cut throating entered his heart. He coveted the bucks. You could argue that at this moment killing a buck became more important than the treatment of his offspring. I was a second rate citizen. Hunting is a cold mother fucker when you are faced with that reality. That doesn’t mean bucks will stay because a lot of them are transient deer. He wanted that deer for himself. Instead of saying something to me, he just dumped some dumb gook in my area to get the blame for messing up my hunting.

I also felt like they were trying to incite me to start some kind of deer killing war where the deer or meat didn’t matter only the argument; reminded me of the Hatfield and McCoys except my father was batting for the other team. I was feeling totally blackballed and betrayed all at the same time. I thought of all the online hunting propaganda about family and felt a deep sense of disillusion. Bad things rolled in my mind like thunderheads but I just got up and walked away to think about it. It was causing me too much stress and my health was suffering for it. This was an adversity I didn’t want to be faced with but there it was; right in my kisser.

Did I really want to go find the buck to shoot it out from under them because they were dishonorable men? What would that make me? Did that render the buck truly valueless?  Did I want to continue this mode of behavior and situations that could cause me to ultimately get hurt because of stupidity? What was I truly fighting for? Hunting? A place? Food? Myself?  Did nothing else matter but killing a creature for the wrong reasons?  Yes, this screamed “for all the wrong reasons”.

I was in crisis.

I went to the neurologist the next day and my blood pressure was 176 over something. I walked through the doctor’s office like a dazed zombie. I realized I was as stress as the deer in the woods because not only were the men antagonizing relentlessly these deer but they were doing the same thing to me in a mean despicable way. I had a serious come to God meeting on my hunting as far as my father’s landscape and the impending tests required the following month along with mind altering meds that would make it dangerous for me and others.

What could I do? I had to put my gun down. Oh the horror! This is not what you wish to face in the middle of a hunting season but there it was. There would be nothing to eat.

I reviewed the facts and it looked grim. The worse thing that bugged me was my father’s behavior. I knew I had to come to some resolution for my own sake. This is what I did. I went to my father’s house and told him I didn’t deserve someone talking to me in such a manner or be treated like a valueless dispensable piece of toilet paper. I told him I wasn’t going to hunt there for the rest of the season which ends in a month. I voiced my opinion and stood up for my own self.

As for the health issue I didn’t want to be stupid and dangerous. I knew I would be Rx prescription meds to ease my pain but alter my ability to react in a normal way to things. That would not be safe for me getting in and out of a stand, aiming a gun, or focusing on a target. After all I don’t desire to harm anyone. Yet there were some thoughts that crossed my mind that I wish to share with readers because I am sure I am not the only one that ever went through such a thing.

You’ll meet people that will call themselves friend but when they try to take advantage of you and insult your family when that is all you have left; it’s time for that so called friend to go. People that come into your life to cause strife are just there for the shits and giggles of troublemaking.

There was also another thought that came with this story. How the undercurrent of learning to live with the acceptance of deception to stay in good standing with people that otherwise you wouldn’t care for because they provide some kind of benefit. I wondered on my capacity to live an honest life in the face of other peoples domineering behavior and misdeeds. This is the same kind of ideal that drives abusive relationships where someone gets beat up, keeps quiet not to make the situation worse but it never stops the bullying.

Blood is thicker than water but water can cut through the mountains. Relatives will let you down, cut your throat, or attempt to drag you down to their level. Don’t go. Be the better person and your own man so to speak even if it causes more of a dissension. At least the offending relative will learn not to pressure you with a bad behavior you don’t need to pick up. It’s your life and you have to live with yourself and your deeds. After another person has ruined you they get to walk away and be Mr. So and So. There will also come a time when that same offending relative will be face down in mud or in a hospital bed and that good old friend getting the freebies will not be there standing over the bed holding their hand or showing concern. Those rat bastards will be over in their house pretending no to know you.

There is a big difference in giving something up temporarily. If you are unwell; stop, drop and roll. Don’t make your problem worse by getting some crazy idea in your head that you are going to do it anyway. You are not gifted with psychic powers and you can’t see future outcomes. Wait things out and take care of yourself. No one is asking you to be a self-sacrificing Moses while putting yourself on the altar to take the shank. The goal is to live another day.

Reflect on this story for there are more things within it. I was reading in my notes about the Law of Self Knowledge that lingers on the topic of Evil for Evil’s Sake where it is difficult to do harm to others when you understand fully what that kind of harm would do to you. Know Thyself. If I would have done anything in retaliation that would have fueled a terrible back and forth chain of event not worth the effort. I choose not to be that kind of person.

What about the mysterious cigarette smoking apparition? Or secret woodland admirer?

I was picking up Catalpa wood logs when I got this weird feeling. I stared across the field that lead to the horse gate. I could see something in the tree line of the woods. It was the small orangish glow of light under the oaks. I thought at first it was my mind but as I walked up my Mustang was moving in the same direction. The other horses were following. Just as I got to the fence she bolted in the other direction with the herd behind her. I investigated the next day but couldn’t find anything.

Someone was out there.

~Courtesy of the AOFH~

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