Gunsmart
Sunday Nov 21, 2004
Going hunting
Man... all this autumnal honking is just about deafening! I can see the headlines at the checkout counter: "Strafed by Mallards!" egads If I could see myself today, as I was in, say, '59, a skinny, nervous, 5'7" kid in his dad's size 12 combat boots & 2 or 3 pairs of sox, in a surplus parka (from the Korean conflict), headed out Van Giesen on foot, with a 16ga. Winchester 97 pump (visible hammer on half-cock) and 5 shells in his pocket- I can already see the gumballs lit up & me on my face in the mud with a foot in my back and my hands cuffed to my ankles... but I made that trip dozens of times in my last 3 years in town, without a fuss- not even a sideways look. Of course, that was Before fear of lawsuits ruled the world... and insurance companies had all the money that wasn't spent on oil. I traded my last (4th) Model 97 for a 40" bar & chain for a Mac saw big enough to hog through a 6' cedar in about 90 seconds (and after I'd used it to ground-sluice 13 coots for Thanksgiving dinner for the family & friends- they all fit, dressed, on a turkey platter... hardly big as bantie chickens). I loved that 97- but after the trigger spring broke, I got tired of retempering the one I made out of my scrench to replace it. I'd get about 4 or 5 shots & it would be bent too much to slam that pin into the primer hard enough to set it off. There's not another feeling like taking a handload for geese out of the magazine & looking at the little dent in the center of the shell, as half a dozen whistlers weighing about 25 pounds apiece go chortling into the fog out on the mud flats... darn! So, my hunting career sort of petered out, and a new level of hunting and gathering commenced- I think it was around 1973 or '74. It has crept back though... brought on by the memory of eating Canada goose (not Canadian geese- I got nothing against canucks- but think I'd prefer the domestic, grain-fed variety) that strolled along the tracks near the elevator alongside the Schuster Parkway, crops bulging with wheat and soybeans. I could probably air-sluice these guys, if I had one of those RPG units, and knew how to calibrate it. Johnny, the One-shot Wonder-boy! Actually, I'd like to have a few of those stingers that the mujahedeen got from the CIA back in the '80s. It would be a kick to put a tracer in it and freak out my rich neighbor when he comes back in his Bell to pick up the wallet he left on the mantel because he was watching the early stock returns and got excited about getting to the office early to cash in. (Actually, he might dig it- but his pilot would probably take evasive action and make them both a little ill.) I don't know if I'd enjoy blowing down the feathered flyboys that go flapping through my skies, these days... not the way I once did. All that acid musta made me soft-headed... think I'd rather eat chanterelles... but, then, maybe it's 'cause I'm still cheap, too... Guns (& ammo!) cost money. I still go out in the woods, in the Fall, though... and hardly ever get shot at- even when performing my "rutting elk caught in a barbed-wire fence" mystery moves. Talk about cheep thrillz.. Hey- when I was living in my schoolbus, I'd stand straight up in my stockinged feet every morning and just touch the ceiling in front of the firebox end of my woodstove. In the evening, after wrestling shakebolts, firewood, etc, I'd stand in the same place- and could get a finger or two between the roof & my hippy hair-do. It seems that all those disks squish out every day, as a result of vertical activities; and then, overnight, expand to their optimum springiness as we somnolesce. Maybe getting older takes a little spring outa them, too- just like that old untempered screwdriver blade that couldn't keep whacking that pin down hard enough...
If they want you, they'll get you, pistoles or no. Me, I think I'd opt for the blazing saddle (in lieu of six-gun)... or hide out in my parka, becoming One with the 'Shroom. ^..^
JHBrowne, Jr.
Vashon Island, Wa
|