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Perspective: The Hunter And The Neighbor

Pixabay + Pixlr

Two turkey hunters entered the predawn darkness of a spring wood.

Well, let’s be honest. One was a turkey hunter, and the other was his neighbor, outfitted in borrowed camos and a hand-me-down shotgun. The day before he had used a turkey-sized hunk of cardboard for target practice.

In the darkness, the hunter said to wait and listen. If a tom turkey gobbled from his roost, they’d go toward him. And like some miracle, a tom gobbled, and they bushwhacked toward the sound. At the edge of a pasture, they climbed into a buckthorn thicket and waited.

An hour passed. The hunter played with his turkey calls, and the neighbor tried to hold still. An indigo bunting perched on a branch just inches from their shotguns, and a small doe walked up for a sniff. They were invisible. The hunter shook his camo seedcap on the ground. The sound mimicked a turkey dropping from his roost. Amazingly, the hat trick worked, and a tom gobbled close by. It was daylight now.

“Here he comes,” the hunter whispered. The tom hauled his red neck and black beard down the treeline toward them.

“What are you waiting for?” How to answer such a question? The neighbor’s view was obscured by his camo face mask and the buckthorn. His heart beat. Could you shoot through this greenery?

The turkey strutted away, too far, and the neighbor blasted. When the dust cleared, the tom flew into an oak at the far side of the pasture. There he sat, out of range, unharmed, peering into the bushes at a couple of turkey hunters.

I’m Chris Fink, and that’s my Perspective.

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