Life

Lost or Found

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Lamenting on the events of the past week and the topic of “loss” in this blog post.

We often say “Sorry for your loss” by way of condolences at funerals. Yes, the loss of a life is something to mourn but as I was standing in the receiving line at a funeral for someone very dear to me on Saturday I wanted to yell “Stop being sorry!”

Perhaps I am I bit eccentric in my way of thinking, but I was not feeling a loss. I was feeling inside of me what can only be described as gratefulness that I was blessed to have this,man in my life for however short a time it was.

To me, loss is when your glasses go missing or a tooth falls out and you keep worrying the area constantly conscious of something being missing. The absence hinders you but eventually you adapt.

I could say that last week was the absolute worst 7 days of my life because one minute I was feeding a man, who was like a father to me, an omlette in the hospital and the next  I was watching him take his last breath. The reality is, I was crushed, saddened, angered, hurt, lonely, panicked, and feeling like my world had collapsed. Once I got over the initial shock of it all my mind started playing slides of our times together. I could see his smile, hear his voice, and the memories wouldn’t stop. Maybe, the storage of memories is the mind’s way of protecting itself in moments like this when such profound saddness threatens to snap that single cord of sanity we all so desperately cling to. The flashbacks remind us of happier times and we are filled with the warm glow of events long passed relishing each memory like a child watching a favorite movie.

The memories also remind us of how blessed we are when certain people enter our lives who are worth mourning when they are gone. People who love us as we are, who teach us life lessons, who take our hands in time of need, and take our hearts when we vow never to love again. The passage of those lives through the pathways of our own adds color, clarity, vibrancy, new ideas, new ways of doing things, and new ways of viewing ourselves and the world.

We gain more than we could ever lose in these situations because we are left not with an empty heart but a full soul, a scrapbook overflowing with the simple blessings of just living and letting others in, if just for a moment to touch our lives.

Yes, there is immeasurable pain when someone we love dies but there is also immeasurable joy to be found in the simple act of calling upon memories created and lessons shared. As for loss, the way I see it is that the sense of loss is simply a fear that we will return back to the person we were before our lives were changed and enriched by the person who is no longer with us. We fear we cannot be strong on our own, that we have lost our reason to keep up the fight when indeed we have only become tougher and more able to face the challenges ahead.

With all of this being said, I hope those of you who take the time to read my ramblings will stop for a moment and realize that when something good goes away in your lives it is not a loss but rather the time to reflect on how much better your life became thanks to that one person or event. Be grateful and not mournful of your blessings however long or short their duration and look forward to what lies ahead. Death does not stop time for those left behind, it simply makes time that much more precious.

 

Once in a Lifetime

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FB_IMG_1471138809076         So often we lament about how short life is and how we need to strive each day to add quality to the time we are given. We vow to take more time for family, adventures, and all those things that make us truly happy before it is too late. We also look back in regret at all the moments lost and things we failed to do in the past. If I have one single regret, it is that I did not meet my black lab Deshka sooner so that we would have had more time together.

Deshka was a gleaming barrel chested lab with a heart of pure gold and a penchant for popcorn. Her instinct to excel in the field was born of years of field trial breeding that ran through her veins. When I met her I had just entered a new relationship and she was part of the deal, the best part. At nine years old she had already bore two litters of pups and was struggling through a bout of Lyme’s Disease which had slowed her down considerably. Her joints were sore, her gait slow and painful, and her eyes betrayed the agony she attempted to hide from me. Her usual favorite sleeping spot under the coffee table began to collect dust as she was unable to contort her body to fit beneath it due to her illness. I lost a season of duck hunting with her that year but by the following fall she was chomping at the bit to get out to the marsh; all pain a distant memory.

It was the greatest fall of our lives. Ducks were in abundance and Deshka was a machine on the water. From her grassy point she would survey the sky like a soldier standing watch for the enemy to approach. Many a time she spotted sneaky teal before I even noticed them and would give out a sigh of exasperation every time I missed a shot. I could almost imagine her rolling her eyes and requesting a new hunting partner. Retrieve after retrieve she never showed a single sign of slowing down and almost majestically, she would come up out of the water, a duck clamped firmly in her mouth, as the early morning sun shone off her red tinted coat like a polished gem.

Her beauty and gentle soul was second to none. I recall being sick for days at a time and she would only leave my side to eat or go outside. I called her “Mamma Bear” for the simple reason that she was so big and comforting like a mamma black bear with her cub. Deshka was my best friend, my confidant, my protector, and my favorite hunting companion.

When I received a call from a friend who was watching Deshka one Friday in November, 2014, I was unprepared for the news that she had passed away at the age of 13 in her sleep on her bed. I was devastated. No, devastated is not the right word. Is there a word to truly explain the feeling of such profound loss that it is like losing a limb, like having your heart deflate in your chest because the very thing that filled it is gone?

I cried for days, I looked at old pictures, I fell apart over the very clumps of her wayward fur that used to frustrate me when they littered the floor, and I agonized over all the times I let her down when she wanted to play or go for a walk. Sometimes I would even imagine that I heard the sound of her claws tapping a staccato beat across the floor to her water dish. I could still feel her weight against my leg as I sat alone on the couch trying to figure out what I would do without her. I am not ashamed to say that I was a wreck.

As they do, time and fate intervened and two weeks after Deshka’s death the opportunity arose to purchase an 11 week old female Polar Bear English Lab. One photo from the breeder was all it took and no three hour drive in a snowstorm would stop me from getting her. My first glimpse of her was love at first sight. An almost white, pot-bellied pup with eyes so compelling that everyone who met her would say that they made her look like an old soul. I named her Freyja after the Norse goddess of love and now, at 3 years of age she is as faithful a companion as anyone could wish for. While she lacks the drive and concentration out in the marsh that Deshka displayed, and she has her “blonde” moments, she remains a blessing and much-needed balm after such an incredible loss.

Not many can understand the bond people like myself have with their pets. My pets are not mere animals, they are invaluable members of the family, irreplaceable and unconditionally loved. They add purpose and quality to each and every day. Most importantly, they have awakened my heart and soul to the concepts of love, loyalty, and companionship in their purest forms. There is a saying by Anatole France that sums it up “Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.” No truer words could be spoken. Deshka gave me the love and companionship of a best friend and I cannot look at a bag of popcorn without the memories rushing back along with a smile. She was a once in a lifetime kind of dog and she will always have my heart.

Frugal to a Fault

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Palms sweaty, I stare at my computer screen as my heart races and that little voice inside my head screams “NO!!!

I hit “Submit” and watch my order zoom off into cyberspace to be delivered “On or before November 7th.”

What have I done??!!! Did I not take into account how many hours I will have to work to pay off this “extravagant” purchase, didn’t I think about how I will have to scrimp and save until the next paycheck, or how I could have gotten by with my old ones for one more year?

I did it, against my will, I went ahead and ordered a new pair of waders. Good grief, I’m still shaking!!

I know this all sounds melodramatic at the least, but you have to understand the mindset of a broke, stubborn German, frugal duck hunter. I had my current waders for 14 years. They saw me through the best hunts of my life. Through thick and thin, sunny Indian Summer days and days cold enough to freeze the devil right out of his sauna.

My waders became part of me, an essential tool, a reliable partner in the swamp, my security blanket. But the frustration of patching them every weekend this season with wader sealant that cost an arm and a leg finally pushed me over the edge.

I simply went online, found a pair that matched all of my needs for warmth, comfort, dependability; hell, with all the criteria I expected from my “perfect” waders I sounded like someone signing up for Match.com! But, I want something that will last, something that will see me through the best of times and the worst of times, something I can count on, simething that will fit me like a glove…in a wader of course!!

All my musings and criteria aside, I settled in 1600 gram insulated 5mil, reinforced knee, quick snap suspender chest waders. An upgrade of sorts.

Yet here I sit admonishing myself for the money spent. $140 in all on a pair that formerly cost $300. Did I make a wise decision? I think so because now at least I won’t be dealing with something that has been patched up more times than Michael Jackson’s face so that’s gotta count for something right?

But, knowing me, I will be lying awake in bed making lists in my head of all the ways I could have stretched the life of my old waders, how many groceries I could have bought with that $140, how new ones will never be the same, and worst of all what if my old waders were a good luck charm and now my hunts will all be cursed?? Argggg!!

Oh the life and drama of a cheapskate with a penchant for hunting!

 

 

Never Enough

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We say it constantly “There are never enough hours in the day.” Why? Because, for the most part, our lives are so inundated with a plethora of tasks we cannot possibly hope to complete in the waking hours we are given.

So focused we become on cramming as much as we can into one day that we fail to see the big picture. It’s like driving on an endless interstate at 100mph being so focused on the task at hand that we completely fail to see what lies to the left and right of that asphalt ribbon.

The truth is, at that very moment when you start to panic over all you didn’t get done you should really be admonishing yourself for all you failed to experience in your mad rush to complete an absurdly long to-do list.

Did you miss your child’s first game, your Mom’s birthday, a chance to sit on a dock and drop a line, a chance to truly live?

I get on my soapbox about this all the time for the simple reason that I see so many unhappy people in this world. Rich, poor, popular, young, old it doesn’t matter. The reasons could be many but I’m convinced the biggest contributor to dissatisfaction in one’s own life is the fact that (as the saying goes) we spend so much time trying to make a living that we forget to make a life for ourselves.

When my dad was putting in 14 hour days at work did you think he ever thought that Mom would get Alzheimers right at the moment when their lives had finally settled down enough for them to enjoy? Heck no! If he had perhaps he would have re-evaluated everything. Nothing is promised in this life, nothing.

I get asked all the time about how can I spend so much time hunting in the swamp or woods? My answer is simple. I disappear every weekend into the swamp because it is where I can shut everything out. Every disappointment, every frustration, every distraction, everything. I am left entirely alone with nothing but magnificent nature around me. No deadlines, no phones ringing, no to-do list and it is exactly why I am a happier person.

So, the next time you glance up at a clock and feel your heart tighten with dread because you still have a million and one things to do ask yourself this “Is all of this worth giving up so much of my life for?”

Happiness and a good life, my friends, are not a matter of how much you can pour into each day but how much you can get out of each day.  Instead of staring at a list of things to do in the morning, write a list of the blessing and experiences you had in those 24 hours. A life well lived is one that is treated like a gift and not a bunch of years to just get through.

Redneck Margarita

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Musing over hunts past as I prepare for another weekend of duck hunting I thought I would share another one of the articles I have written about my hunting adventures for you to enjoy!

 

Needles of ice were hitting my bedroom window, awakening me in darkness to the last day of the duck season 2004. The wind howled through the trees like some phantom hound on the trail of an unseen foe as I slowly extracted myself from the flannel warmth of my quilt piled bed. So simple it would have been to turn over and succumb to the warm beaconing fingers of slumber but this was it, the very last chance I had to redeem my season and savor one more day on the water that would have to last me the long months until the next opener.

By the time I was on the road, the world outside was covered in a sheet of ice. Old tires on fence posts reflected in my headlights like the sugar glazed donuts which fueled my early morning jaunts. The sky was dark and thick like the midnight coffee keeping me awake.

At the boat landing, fellow hunters were slip sliding down the ramp using kitty litter, sand, and old scraps of carpeting to obtain traction under bald tires. The water was churning ominous and black as I started the motor and braced myself against the onslaught.

I felt like Captain Ahab in a 14ft Jon Boat; my enemy not some leviathan of the deep but rather the petrified bodies of ancient trees laying just below the surface. Those who came before me had attempted to mark the watery Graves with driftwood and u-posts. Many a morning I would hear the steady whine of an engine cut short as an unwary boater hit those underwater threats.

Safe at my spot parked in a tattered frag, I battled waves that threatened to swamp my vessel as I attempted to produce some semblance of a line of diver decoys. A hodgepodge of repurpose and repainted decoys bobbed among rafts of slushy ice like some giant redneck Margarita. By the time I was finished setting up, my left hand was clamped frozen to the gunwale, my nose was left red and dripping like an old man eating chicken soup, and a layer of ice cloaked me from head to toe.

Settling in as best I could, the ice continued to pelt me, hitting the aluminum of the boat with a raspy beat. Then, right at shooting time it happened. At first I was frozen in place, not so much from the cold but from the pure shock one feels when bearing witness to a phenomenon never before experienced.

The sky suddenly darkened a shade, not from the storm but from countless dive bombing winged bodies. I sat transfixed as time stopped and everything seemed to move in slow motion like in those superhero movies where the character is not moving but all the things around him are circling minutely as the world explodes.

Divers were pouring out of the sky, landing on the uncertain water then lifting up to hover and land again. Snapping to attention, I regained my purpose and stood in awe as varieties of ducks I only dreamed of shooting were laying at my feet.

When the onslaught subsided, I was left in breathless wonder. I looked around me, pinched my arm to see if it was all just a dream then proceeded to knock the ice from my tangled decoys.

It was then that Mother Nature had her fun. As I was bending over trying to untangle some deaks, an especially large wave struck the boat with enough force to knock me into a frozen bath. Pulling myself out of the water I imagined that every duck in the sky was giving their version of the old high ball at seeing “The Mighty Hunter” do her imitation of the Swan dive.

Wrapped in a moth-eaten army blanket, I finished the day out and went home with my first full plumage shovler and bluebill. My limit was achieved that day in ducks and experience.

When I arrived at the landing I soon realized that I was not the only one who was glad that she got out of bed that morning. Fellow hunters were chattering and gesturing wildly about the fantastic morning we all had out in the storm.

In life and in hunting we have two choices: to either call off the fight due to rain or pick up our gear and soldier on. Life is not lived when we shy away from a challenge. Life is lived when we duck our heads into the storm regardless of the risks. Frozen feet, soggy waders, and tangled decoys are a small price to pay for a lifetime of memories such as this!

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Traditions

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20171024_103609Many a time I am asked about how I got into hunting and my response generally is that I was born into it. The following is an article that was published that I wrote in honor of my mom and the legacy she passed on to me.

 

Black and white photos have a way of taking us back in time, as if the sepia tones have the power to soften our memories and lend a golden glow to that which once was. In the 1950’s my mom was growing up the youngest daughter of a poor farmer in Carver County, MN. No stranger to hard work, she also went out in the field trapping, hunting, and fishing. Not as a sport, but as a necessity.

As a teenager, she ran her own coon hounds and went fearlessly into the marsh to hunt ducks with her best friend Myra and an Ithaca shotgun. This is the woman who brought me into the world. A 5ft tall powerhouse with the spirit of a tiger and the heart of an angel. Now, when I look into her rheumy eyes and see the clouded confusion that the Alzheimers has lent to her gaze, I know without a doubt why hunting is such a huge part of my life. Each time I go out into the woods or marsh I think of that fearless young woman my mom once was, blazing a trail for female hunters in her own little way.

My need to hunt comes not from a desire to go home with my limit of birds but from a deep seated need to keep alive a legacy that was started on a small farm in West Central Minnesota. To get up before the sun and watch the sky give bloody birth to a new day, to feel the frigid air burning my lungs, to smell the scent of gunpowder as I take my first shot, to hear the ghost-like whisper of duck wings flying over me, and to taste the flavors that being in the outdoors lends to an ordinary Camp breakfast. These are the things that keep calling me back season after season.

These days I hunt a rich backwater marsh off the Mississippi River in Wisconsin. It has become a sanctuary, a place to leave behind the modern world and step into an untouched piece of the earth that is as healing as it is beautiful. One can walk for hours or just sit on a creek bank and watch as mallards and gadwall buoy themselves against the current, happily hidden in their wooded abode.

The hunting is unpredictable, as most things are, and I can go days without shooting a duck, yet, each time I leave a part of me stays behind. So I go back. I would go back every day of the season if I could to catch the sunrise, to feel the thrill of kamikaze teal teasing me with their sudden appearance and disappearance. Then, out of pure luck, the planets align and a small flock cups into the pocket where I am standing. Feet down, russet feathers ablaze in the early morning sun and the soft swoosh of the water as they land in front of me. Moments like this have the power of hypnotism, to blind you to your purpose as you stare dumbfounded for a moment before the adrenaline kicks in and you spook them off the water for a shot.

The hunt is not over when a duck falls, I take that flagging life into my hands and gaze down at the miracle of feathers and wings and thank the powers that I believe in for what was sacrificed, what was given. I give a prayer in honor of the bird, and to soothe my own soul and then I go home humbled. That is the way of the marsh, a circle that begins and ends day after day and those of us who are lucky enough to stand in the middle of it all are blessed in unmeasurable ways.

So, when someone asks me why I am a hunter, why do I want to crawl around the mud at 5am and stand out in the cold when I could be home in bed? I say give it a try once. Even if you don’t think you will like it, just go out there one time and tell me that you didn’t at least learn something about patience, appreciation for life, the wonder of raw nature, and a better understanding of your own self when you are removed from the modern world if only for a couple of hours. Hunting to me, is more than just bringing home bands and feathers, it’s bringing home memories and continuing a legacy started on that hard scrabble farm in Minnesota by my incredible mother.