Now I’ve been a hunter’s wife for more than 14 years. I’ve been a hunter’s mom for the last three or four years, since my oldest son has been old enough to join his dad. I always thought that was where my hunting role would end. I’d never had any interest in hunting. I’ve often felt that I was competing with hunting for my husband’s affections. But all of this would change last fall.
My husband, Reuben, is a boilermaker. It’s a great job. It allows him to be home with us all summer. He wouldn’t miss our boys’ baseball seasons. Brady is six years old and plays T-ball. Robbie is 12 and plays in two baseball leagues. The job often conflicts with hunting season, though. This is a sacrifice he struggles with. He had always managed to be home for the annual two-day youth season. Last fall, it just wouldn’t work out that way. That left me at home with our then eleven year old son wanting to hunt. I had NEVER hunted. I had tried scouting for deer once, but I couldn’t sit still long enough to make it worth our while. I had learned to shoot the guns, just in case I ever needed to, but that’s where it ended. With a little encouragement from my husband, I agreed to take Robbie out for the twoday hunt.
I had never used that hunter education course, but I would need it to purchase my first-ever hunting permit and tag. I would officially become a licensed hunter in order to take Robbie out in the woods, in hopes of killing his first deer. He had killed a few turkeys in prior years but never a deer.
So, with our permits in hand, he and I set out before daylight Saturday morning. We set up in a hunting blind on a food plot that my husband had planted in Alfa Rack and wheat. I took my CD walkman, cell phone, and snacks. I was prepared to stay a while. As it turned out, we would spend thirteen hours in that blind, only taking a 45-minute break for lunch. We saw several deer; lot of does and young bucks. Robbie had an opportunity to shoot a small seven point. It would have been fine for his first deer kill, but his dad’s management values are already ingrained in his mind. Let him grow some more. He passed on it and would second guess that decision later. We sat and scoured that three acres with our binoculars until it was obviously too dark to shoot. Again, Dad’s teachings would kick in. Don’t get out and spook the deer off. Then, we saw him. All we could see was antlers, lots of them, and just the silhouette of a body. We didn’t know if our eyes were playing tricks on us or what. That buck would walk within 15 feet of us, but it was just too dark to safely shoot at anything. We were fired up to go again the next morning. Robbie even said, “No breaks tomorrow!”
The next morning started like the one before. Walkman, phone, snacks. The morning would go much better, though. It got off to a slow start. We didn’t see a single deer for the first hour and a half. Finally, a buck appeared on the far side of the plot, 175 yards away. He wasn't the one from the night before, but he looked like a good one. He slowly wandered our way, eating. Robbie decided this was one he would shoot. I was trying to get a better look at him in the binoculars when I heard the gun go off. All I saw was hair flying up. The buck ran a few yards and stopped perfectly broadside, again. BOOM! Robbie took a second shot. He wasn’t letting this one get away from him. The deer ran a few feet and into the wood line. Robbie was positive he had hit him.
The excitement had his teeth chattering, body trembling, and shells in his pocket jingling. My heart was about to beat out of my chest when I called Pennsylvania to wake Reuben and tell him that Robbie had shot his first deer, and it was a good one. I’m not sure which of the three of us was more excited. We walked the 120 yards to where he had shot and found a good blood trail. Reuben told us to go back to the house and wait about an hour to look for him. Easier said than done. That was the longest hour! We took Reuben’s dad with us to look for the deer. We found the buck about 100 feet into the woods. Robbie had taken out the heart with one shot and the lungs with the other. I was so proud. I was happy to have shared in the experience but sad that my husband missed it.
That hunter education course some 20 years earlier had been good for something after all. It allowed me to experience one of the sweetest memories of my life. I might even use it again this year. And maybe we’ll get another chance at the big one that got away!
Editors Note: This story was from two seasons ago. Amy and Robbie went hunting this past year again and Amy sent this update:
