The one That Got Away

“The one that got away”

I remember this day like no other in my life, was a cold afternoon in September, I believe I was fifteen. My uncle pulled up in his green Toyota, a small but comfortable truck (Thank God, the ride was a long one). At the time I lived in Sherman, a growing town north of Dallas. Our destination was a small town called Mineral Wells, what could possibly await in this small town that would have a big impact on my life?

My Grandfather rented a deer lease in this small, hick town. Why? To make his grandson a man by shooting a massive buck, though at first I thought it was a small meaning to him, I could see in his eyes that he has been waiting for this a long time. The camp consists of an R.V, a fire pit, and a metal pipe fence to keep in the horses and the donkeys. The windmill I remember the most though, it was tall with chipping grey paint due to how old this instrument seemed. We set up camp and I fell asleep with praising’s of my first deer in my head.

“Wake up pookie-head” my uncle told me, God I hated that word when I was little, mainly because I didn’t know what it meant and he would never tell me. It was still dark outside, maybe four in the morning. He throw me a jacket and pants that looked like there where leaves and branches sown on them, later to be known as camouflage gear. Putting on my boots my uncle smiles and says “Dustin, put this on”, it was a small, amber bottle of…..Deer piss? Ewwww! “What the hell do I do with this?” I ask, “Put in on your boots, brings in bucks looking for doe’s in heat”. Then I put on close pins that smelt like they where grown from an almond tree, the more “pleasant” smell I wore. My Grandfather woke up next and put on everything like a pro with no whining of the urine on his boots.

Driving a truck that he bought just for this occasion, he pulled up to a small clearing in this jungle of a place. “Look in front fat-man, look ahead”, I looked up to break my concentration from the black powder riffle I was in aw of the whole drive, to experienced a breath taking scenery of beauty. The grass was bright perfect green with moss growing on the thick trees around the clearing, the clouds where thick and let little rays of sunlight shine through the pink outlines of the beautiful blue horizon while a golden tint grew fainter as it ventures away from the sun, as if somehow God is showing us that he has not left humanity by sharing his beautiful painting of life. A massive weeping willow tree at least twenty foot tall leaned over a crystal clear pond, seeming as though the long limp branches where trying to escape the imprisonment of its home just too barely touch the surface of earth’s heavenly water. “Come on fat-man, lets get.” My grandfather whispers, there was a shed hidden from view to keep from destroying the clearings innocents. The shed was old and looked worn down with only 2 folding chairs and a portable heater, shivering I turned it on.

Three hours have passed of just sitting down and starring through a slit, cut out about half a foot wide and as long as the shed. “Fat-man….look” a mother deer and her fawn came out by the willow tree to take a drink from the pond, the time of being a man is upon me…..can I handle the pressure? “Ok your on your own do what I thought you son.” I pulled the hammer back and put a cap on the nipple….. I’m ready to become a man.

I put the gun through the slit in the shed, fast but yet slow and careful enough