I guess everybody has a way of assuring himself that tomorrow will, indeed, bring better things. More prudent men save their money, practice on low house 8, or refuse to postpone until tomorrow what they know they should do today. I plan trips. Furthermore I plan them in detail, trips that I know I'll probably never even come close to making.
For example, I'm trying to locate a fairly inexpensive .375 magnum and I am planning a place around home to shoot it every now and then on the theory that someday I'll hunt the greater kudu and the giant sable. There's an empty place in my gun rack (there are a lot of empty, but reserved, places in my gun rack) for the .375, right next to my .338 Winchester magnum that I acquired many years ago on the slim premise that I might someday hunt the huge brown bear.
Sitting next to the .338 is a Model 70 .270 sighted in for 250 yards, in case I ever get a chance at bighorn sheep. Below the rifles is a skinning knife, pristine, except that now and then I take it out and run the blade across a stone and shave a hair or so off my arm to prove beyond a doubt to me that should the chance arise, I'm ready. Across the room are maps of Africa, British Columbia, and Alaska.
A very experienced hunter once told me that, to him, the hunt was over when he had the quarry in the crosshairs of the scope. To me, the hunt begins with the unfolding of a map. It may be an evening reverie over a quail hunt in South Carolina or the dream of stalking something in Tanzania.
I have brochures that tell me what to pack and wear in East Africa. I have maps with red lines drawn on them that tell me how to get from home to the places where the wild turkeys live. And when I chance to meet a guide from the South who promises me a fine shoot over good dogs should I ever get a chance to be down his way, I thank him, and we make a mutually mythical date to hunt together.
And now and then, I really go, not as far or as fancily as I can go by leafing through my brochures, but at least enough to taste a different flavor of the wind. That's one of the great things about hunting--there's always someplace else to go and something else to see. One dream fuels another, reassuring us of a reason for being. Right this minute there's a campfire burning somewhere, and I can smell the smoke. Somewhere there's an old bull elk that I might meet, a pointer that I might shoot over, or a lion that I will listen to at night.
This story originally appeared in Mostly Tailfeathers by Gene Hill. Copyright (c) 1971-73 Gene Hill. All rights reserved.