The grocery store was uncommonly crowded and busy today. Kind of like it is before the 4th of July, Memorial Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas. Only instead of being crowded with frazzled women, it was crowded with glassy-eyed men. Middle-aged men with mustaches and caps, blue jeans and boots, stocking up on chips and canned goods looking slightly out of place but without a doubt knowing where they were going: deer camp.
Deer season starts November 15, and it's as big a holiday as any around these parts.
Pardon my pilfering of a presidential phrase, but let's be clear: This is firearm deer season. Each year it runs from November 15 through November 30. Men and a few women disappear into the woods and hunt deer with firearms (rifles). There are other deer seasons, such as muzzle loader (a different kind of rifle) and bow (or archery) as well as youth (meaning kids only get to hunt), but it is the adult firearm deer season that causes local businesses to shut down, leaving just a rag-tag sign on the door: "Gone hunting." There will be ads in the paper to remind us that such-and-such-a business will be closed Saturday or Monday or Wednesday or whatever day or days due to deer season; women (and maybe a few men) will head south to Appleton or Green Bay to shop, to see a show, to celebrate being a "hunter's widow," or just to have their own kind of fun.
As with most holidays, grocery shopping is an important part of the season. Many hunters congregate at camps out in the woods. These camps are usually a small cabin or two that have been in the family for years, opening their doors, shaking their dust, and airing out each November as they host hunting parties of extended family and friends. Some camps may well be fancy log cabins with indoor plumbing and down comforters and roaring fireplaces and big screen TVs - I don't know - but mostly what you hear about are camps that sound like log shacks listing toward rickety outhouses. The wool blankets have been nibbled by mice, the wood stoves are drafty, the cribbage boards are old and battered. They are places where memories are burnished deep in cheap chipped plates. No matter; when you're at camp you're away from civilization, so hunters pack their pickups with chips and canned goods and beer and soda and maybe a frozen pizza or two.
People around here will tell you hunting is about tradition, and by that they mean it's about something good, something that's worth maintaining and passing on. It's about being with family and friends, about being in the woods, about forging bonds, about solitude and self-reliance. It's about skill, knowledge, patience, an understanding of nature and of deer - an understanding of your prey. It's about biology (after you kill it, you have to gut it, hang it, preserve it), it's about cooking, it's about meat on the table. Each year the local paper dishes out a number of venison recipes, from stew to steak to sausage.
And yes, it's about bagging a buck, the bigger the better, the larger the rack the greater number of points.
I know, hunting is controversial. I grew up in an urban area far from the hunt, thought hunting was just about killing, and always held the belief that that was surely cruel sport. When I first came to the Upper Peninsula on a vacation one August I was worried that if I took a walk in the woods with my dogs one of us might get shot by an overzealous nut in red-checkered plaid and high-laced boots. This did not happen, and over the past few years living here I have learned that in August I am more likely to be startled by a bear in a blueberry patch than a bullet in the butt, and that although in some cases hunting may indeed be a cruel sport, few things are one thing and one thing only. Even among hunters there is controversy, with some old-timers believing their methods were more, shall we say, "sporting" than ones in vogue today, and there seems to be many opinions among hunters on how best to "manage" the deer herd to keep it robust and healthy.
But today I went to the grocery store and roamed the aisles and bumped carts and searched for items and compared prices with men in caps and mustaches and jeans and boots. They are hunters, I am not. Big deal.
Deer season starts November 15, and it's as big a holiday as any around these parts.
Pardon my pilfering of a presidential phrase, but let's be clear: This is firearm deer season. Each year it runs from November 15 through November 30. Men and a few women disappear into the woods and hunt deer with firearms (rifles). There are other deer seasons, such as muzzle loader (a different kind of rifle) and bow (or archery) as well as youth (meaning kids only get to hunt), but it is the adult firearm deer season that causes local businesses to shut down, leaving just a rag-tag sign on the door: "Gone hunting." There will be ads in the paper to remind us that such-and-such-a business will be closed Saturday or Monday or Wednesday or whatever day or days due to deer season; women (and maybe a few men) will head south to Appleton or Green Bay to shop, to see a show, to celebrate being a "hunter's widow," or just to have their own kind of fun.
As with most holidays, grocery shopping is an important part of the season. Many hunters congregate at camps out in the woods. These camps are usually a small cabin or two that have been in the family for years, opening their doors, shaking their dust, and airing out each November as they host hunting parties of extended family and friends. Some camps may well be fancy log cabins with indoor plumbing and down comforters and roaring fireplaces and big screen TVs - I don't know - but mostly what you hear about are camps that sound like log shacks listing toward rickety outhouses. The wool blankets have been nibbled by mice, the wood stoves are drafty, the cribbage boards are old and battered. They are places where memories are burnished deep in cheap chipped plates. No matter; when you're at camp you're away from civilization, so hunters pack their pickups with chips and canned goods and beer and soda and maybe a frozen pizza or two.
People around here will tell you hunting is about tradition, and by that they mean it's about something good, something that's worth maintaining and passing on. It's about being with family and friends, about being in the woods, about forging bonds, about solitude and self-reliance. It's about skill, knowledge, patience, an understanding of nature and of deer - an understanding of your prey. It's about biology (after you kill it, you have to gut it, hang it, preserve it), it's about cooking, it's about meat on the table. Each year the local paper dishes out a number of venison recipes, from stew to steak to sausage.
And yes, it's about bagging a buck, the bigger the better, the larger the rack the greater number of points.
I know, hunting is controversial. I grew up in an urban area far from the hunt, thought hunting was just about killing, and always held the belief that that was surely cruel sport. When I first came to the Upper Peninsula on a vacation one August I was worried that if I took a walk in the woods with my dogs one of us might get shot by an overzealous nut in red-checkered plaid and high-laced boots. This did not happen, and over the past few years living here I have learned that in August I am more likely to be startled by a bear in a blueberry patch than a bullet in the butt, and that although in some cases hunting may indeed be a cruel sport, few things are one thing and one thing only. Even among hunters there is controversy, with some old-timers believing their methods were more, shall we say, "sporting" than ones in vogue today, and there seems to be many opinions among hunters on how best to "manage" the deer herd to keep it robust and healthy.
But today I went to the grocery store and roamed the aisles and bumped carts and searched for items and compared prices with men in caps and mustaches and jeans and boots. They are hunters, I am not. Big deal.
