My Memories of Hunting Season

Dressing up in camouflage, spraying myself with deer urine, walking miles in the woods to get to the tree stand providing optimal viewing of the forest landscape. Rubbing buck antlers together to entice a deer. Nope, I didn't do any of that stuff. 

Story #1: It was a fall day in high school when I was driving to Caribou. When you round the big corner on the Washburn Road you'll see a potato field to your left (a field I worked in for the Howard family during potato harvest season my senior year of high school) then a patch of woods. In that field was a hunter with his gun ready to fire at a deer standing at the edge of the woods.

I'm not so fond of guns, shooting stuff, killing animals, yah know. So I did the only thing I could think of to disrupt the situation and save the deer... I laid on my horn as I drove by. I don't know if I successfully scared the deer away because I kept driving. But I was thankful the hunter didn't turn around and aim at me.

Story #2: I took physical education all 4 years of high school. I loved it! Until one semester my sophomore year when I was the only girl in a gym class of all guys. Not as dreamy as it sounds, especially since most of the guys were in my brother's senior class. One of them used to pass me the ball out of pity. Gee, thanks.

It was hunting season and our gym teacher, Mr. Worcester, allowed us (or should I say allowed them) to do something different one class. Instead of getting in our gym clothes and playing sports, everyone that had shot and killed something during hunting season could bring in their game to cook during class.

Obviously we didn't cook in the gymnasium. We took over the student kitchen where the older kids had lunch. I believe the boys brought in deer and bear meat. There might have been other stuff, but I didn't pay much attention. Knowing I wasn't going to eat any of that, I brought in a frozen pizza - to which one of the guys asked me, "Where did you shoot that?!" HAHAHA!

The smell was wretched. When the bell rang the older kids filed in for their lunch period. I still remember the look on some of the senior girls' faces as they smelled what my gym classmates had been cooking. Priceless! Yes, it stank to high heavens.

At the end of the semester I transferred into a different gym class with a better girl to boy ratio. And those are my special memories about hunting season in Maine.