Now this story did not occur in Osage County but the joy of the hunt was taught there and I can blame it on how I was raised. You see when I was growing up Dad, Cliff Olson, took us hunting at night relatively often as a form of entertainment. Basically if the Beverly Hill Billies were not on TV or Bonanza then it was a good night to go hunting.
What most folks think of is coon hunting but that was not our thing. But let me explain that sport as well since my Pope (pronounced POP-E') Jess Lane (my grandad) was a coon hunter. The sport is basically a lot of guys making a camp along the creek drinking coffee and telling stories into the wee hours of the night unless the night is enterupted by the sound of coon dogs who found a coon. Now I did assume you knew that a coon is a Raccoon. What the hunters would do is turn the dogs lose to run up and down the creek until they found a coon who would abruptly climb up a tree to get away from the dogs. At that point the dogs would surround the tree and bark like heck until the coffee-drinking story-telling hunters came to bail them out. I thought it was a lot of fun but we were not coffee drinkers in those days and we did not have that many coon dogs so basically it was just a few guys hanging around the campfire along the creek but we did tell stories.
Now night hunting for us was riding in the back of the pickup on gravel roads with guns in our hands, yes guns and we were very young so get over it. Anyway, dad and mom and sometimes Debbie would ride along and help spot game (game=animals) along the roads. We basically had two targets that we tried to kill: rabbits and skunks. We always saw other kinds of animals like badgers which were about the meanest and scariest thing you could get cross-ways with, coyotes, seldom a deer, bobcats, very rarely a fox. Of course the rabbits were for eating and the skunks were for leaving wherever they were killed. It was really a lot of fun and you just hoped that dad would not jam on the brakes too fast or take off too fast.
That brings me to attempted murder over a skunk. When I was in college my roommate was Lynn Snyder (a Baptist gonna be preacher and now he is one full time down in Houston area). In college in those days I always kept my 12 gauge shotgun handy in case I got bored and needed to go hunting. Well one night Lynn and I decided to go skunk hunting and it was well after midnight. We were driving a back road when we saw a yellow camaro which we assumed belonged to another gonna-be preacher. The car was parked on one of those pull-ins where there is a gate along the road. We saw him and his girlfriend parking. They were making out if you know what I mean. Actually I should explain because back in those days sitting in a car late at night did not necessarily mean you were doing something besides making out (kissing) and talking. Anyway we decided we should scare them a little so we shot our guns close by but of course not at the car.
Dadgummit, it was not our friend. We scared them half to death and they started chasing us. They were in a Camaro and we were in a pickup so they caught up pretty fast. Lynn decided this was stupid in that we did not do anything besides scare them so he proceeded to stop. Well the Camaro stopped so fast that the car was sliding sideways toward us. Lynn jumped out of the pickup with the gun in hand which was quit stupid and it scared them again. They threw the car in reverse and went straight to the police station where they filed charges for attempted murder. NOT COOL!
There are a lot of details in this story which are quit funny and I don't have the space in this story to tell all but one of the funny parts happened later when we were exonerated from this charge. The guy who owned the Camaro was actually a friend of mine and his girl friend I did not know. The guy worked with me in the computer lab at Wealtherford (SWOSU and in those days it was SWSC) and he apologized for causing me all the trouble but his girl friend was really mad. Lynn and I spent a bunch of money getting this thing fixed. The judge thought the whole story was funny but made us pay a fine for hunting at night from the road and our lawyer who knew us real well from church discounted his fee but he laughed himself silly as well.
So what did I learn in the Osage or at college?
What most folks think of is coon hunting but that was not our thing. But let me explain that sport as well since my Pope (pronounced POP-E') Jess Lane (my grandad) was a coon hunter. The sport is basically a lot of guys making a camp along the creek drinking coffee and telling stories into the wee hours of the night unless the night is enterupted by the sound of coon dogs who found a coon. Now I did assume you knew that a coon is a Raccoon. What the hunters would do is turn the dogs lose to run up and down the creek until they found a coon who would abruptly climb up a tree to get away from the dogs. At that point the dogs would surround the tree and bark like heck until the coffee-drinking story-telling hunters came to bail them out. I thought it was a lot of fun but we were not coffee drinkers in those days and we did not have that many coon dogs so basically it was just a few guys hanging around the campfire along the creek but we did tell stories.
Now night hunting for us was riding in the back of the pickup on gravel roads with guns in our hands, yes guns and we were very young so get over it. Anyway, dad and mom and sometimes Debbie would ride along and help spot game (game=animals) along the roads. We basically had two targets that we tried to kill: rabbits and skunks. We always saw other kinds of animals like badgers which were about the meanest and scariest thing you could get cross-ways with, coyotes, seldom a deer, bobcats, very rarely a fox. Of course the rabbits were for eating and the skunks were for leaving wherever they were killed. It was really a lot of fun and you just hoped that dad would not jam on the brakes too fast or take off too fast.
That brings me to attempted murder over a skunk. When I was in college my roommate was Lynn Snyder (a Baptist gonna be preacher and now he is one full time down in Houston area). In college in those days I always kept my 12 gauge shotgun handy in case I got bored and needed to go hunting. Well one night Lynn and I decided to go skunk hunting and it was well after midnight. We were driving a back road when we saw a yellow camaro which we assumed belonged to another gonna-be preacher. The car was parked on one of those pull-ins where there is a gate along the road. We saw him and his girlfriend parking. They were making out if you know what I mean. Actually I should explain because back in those days sitting in a car late at night did not necessarily mean you were doing something besides making out (kissing) and talking. Anyway we decided we should scare them a little so we shot our guns close by but of course not at the car.
Dadgummit, it was not our friend. We scared them half to death and they started chasing us. They were in a Camaro and we were in a pickup so they caught up pretty fast. Lynn decided this was stupid in that we did not do anything besides scare them so he proceeded to stop. Well the Camaro stopped so fast that the car was sliding sideways toward us. Lynn jumped out of the pickup with the gun in hand which was quit stupid and it scared them again. They threw the car in reverse and went straight to the police station where they filed charges for attempted murder. NOT COOL!
There are a lot of details in this story which are quit funny and I don't have the space in this story to tell all but one of the funny parts happened later when we were exonerated from this charge. The guy who owned the Camaro was actually a friend of mine and his girl friend I did not know. The guy worked with me in the computer lab at Wealtherford (SWOSU and in those days it was SWSC) and he apologized for causing me all the trouble but his girl friend was really mad. Lynn and I spent a bunch of money getting this thing fixed. The judge thought the whole story was funny but made us pay a fine for hunting at night from the road and our lawyer who knew us real well from church discounted his fee but he laughed himself silly as well.
So what did I learn in the Osage or at college?
- Be careful when you are hunting skunks there might be stink on it even if you don't shoot a skunk. Think about it?
- Make friends with folks who don't over react
- There are always consequences for bad behavior and you may get forgiveness but the consequences are still there. That reminds me of a Christian principle: Grace is free and sufficient but there are still consequences on earth for your bad decisions or behavior.
Thanks for your time,
gary@thepioneerman.com
No comments:
Post a Comment