My first and last bow and arrow - one heck of an egg head

Preston on one of my tractors

I loved being a cowboy but I really loved being an Indian with my bow and arrow I got for Christmas when I was about 7.  Now if you never had one let me tell you it is very difficult to pull back the string with the arrow in it.  In all those movies I don't believe they used much of one because they pulled back too easy.  Anyway, it was a killer getting the string on the bow as the bow is normally straight and you have to step over it and hold between your legs while you use all your weight to bend the bow and latch the string on.  Then the fun begins.

I always strained to pull back that string and mount an arrow but the worst part was when you let it go and that dad-gum string fired up your arm holding the bow.  Your arm would be beat red and the more arrows you shot the more timid you got.  But after a while you adjusted so not to have that happen.   Well the best part about living on the farm is there were lots of targets and most of them you did not want mom and dad to know about.  Don't tell anyone we shot holes in the barn.

My favorite target was shooting straight up in the air and then making sure when the arrow started on the way down it did not stick in my head.  I never did get hurt but it came pretty close many times.  Another favorite was shooting at rabbits that were escaping from the hay fields as we cut hay.  Now the way that worked as you cut hay you start on the outside of the field (about 80 acres) and you cut in circles.  The field gets smaller and the circles get smaller and the rabbits keep moving toward the middle so that when dad was cutting the hay and he got right down to that last half acre the rabbits started running everywhere.  It was next to impossible for me to hit one of those rabbits so many times I would just lay down the bow and arrow and chase the rabbits.  It is amazing that the Indians would not starve to death unless they were better shots than me. 

Now another great opportunity was taking a gallon of gasoline and setting it out about 50 feet then tying a piece of cloth to the arrow tip.  At that point I would light the cloth and proceed to take shots at that gallon of gasoline.  It was actually a lot of fun when you got a hit as there would be a significant explosion and a ball of fire.  As I remember Dad just laughed and boy was I glad.  I think Dad had a real ornery streak in him. 

Now there were many targets but Eddy Harris and I seemed to always be attracted to the chicken house.  We would gather up eggs and head to the hay barn where we would set up our targets and have at it.  I don't know how many eggs Eddy and I broke over the years but it was a big number.  I would say in was in the few thousands.  You may remember in one of my earlier stories when Eddy and I were throwing eggs just as dad came into the hen house.  Eddy knocked dad's hat off and we got in big trouble.

We never did try to shoot at each other which was a good thing since we probably would have killed each other.  We had too much fun together.  Did I mention the time we took five gallons of Orange Allis Chalmers paint (Allis Chalmers is a brand of tractor) and we painted every tool and item we could find in the barns at Eddy's house.  I bet you today, 50 years later, you could still find a remnant of our good times.  Kind of like in Isaiah where God promises the Jews that He will preserve the remnant.  Maybe those tools are Jewish?

Oh well, what did we learn?

• Gravity - what goes up must come down - we were natural born scientist
• We always knew eggs-actly what we were doing
• Orange is a Jewish color because He allowed us to preserve the remnant in Orange

Thanks for the time,
gary @thepioneerman.com