How to
Kill a Deer Without a Gun
By
Jane
B. Wallace
Okay –
just so ‘ya know -- you are hearing from an animal LOVER
who has never grasped how anyone could find sport
at pointing a gun at and killing a beautiful deer – on
purpose. Yes, yes, yes, I completely understand that
they overpopulate the earth, and that if you hunt them
and eat them, it's completely reasonable. But, that
still doesn't mean that I have to LIKE the idea of
baiting them with feeders, sittin' up in fake trees,
and slaughtering those beautiful creatures. To each his
own. . .yes?
Unfortunately, today I write to you as one
of the slaughterers. And even worse -- I killed my deer
out of season. No, I didn't bait a deer feeder, nor did
I climb up in a deer stand and wait idly for an innocent
victim. Neither did I entice the eight-point buck with
tasty tidbits of corn or whatever the tantalizing feed
is near the stands that "tree" hunters use. My weapon
wasn't a rifle either. My weapon . . . was John’s (my
husband) Ford pick-up. It was probably the better
weapon of my only two choices -- my Ford Explorer is
somewhat smaller than his Ford 150, and I might have
done physical harm to myself with my own weapon. Fate
chose my weapon wisely.
The
deer was a beautiful sight in front of the truck at
6:30
a.m.
on the morning of
September 1, 2006.
He reminded me of one of Santa's flying reindeer
that you see in children's books of a Christmas scene.
He was poised in midair flight. In the fraction of a
moment, a permanent image was burned in my mind's eye.
I saw a flying deer's beautiful face in profile, with
a Bambi-like brown eye with long black eyelashes that
presented no fear whatsoever. In that frozen
moment, it felt as if I could almost reach out and
touch the soft tawny hair on his firm back and
strong muscular shoulders.
But
then the phenomenon ended and I heard a horrible
BANG! To me, the deer kept right on flying to
the right -- the same direction in which he was headed.
It was as if the
bang was a simple interruption in his dash
across the dark road. But, of course that's
not reality. I was traveling between 40 and 45 MPH, he
was square in front of me, and the front of the
truck struck him broadside as he leapt across the road.
I hoped he was alive and went back searching for him. I
was hopeful - when I didn't see his body - that he’d
made it and had run off into the woods. But, such was
not his fate. The impact sent him flying 15 feet into
a ditch and the damage to my husband's truck was
estimated at nearly $3,000.
Later,
John found the deer’s body and told me he was sure it
died instantly. I don't know if he was just telling me
that to make me feel better; but I don't want to know
any different. I went back and took a picture of him .
. . just because. When I saw him lying in that ditch,
stiff in the stench of death, I instead focused on the
image of that gorgeous flying creature before the big
bang.
