Speaker 1: Welcome to this country Life.
Speaker 2: I'm your host, Brent Reeves from cone hunting to trot
Speaker 2: lining and just general country living.
Speaker 1: I want you to stay.
Speaker 2: Awhile as I share my experiences and life lessons. This
Speaker 2: country Life is presented by Case Knives on Meat Eaters
Speaker 2: Podcast Network, bringing you the best outdoor podcast.
Speaker 1: The airwaves have to offer.
Speaker 2: All right, friends, grab a chair or drop that tailgate.
Speaker 2: I've got some stories to share. Letting go. Life lessons
Speaker 2: arrive in various vessels during our natural maturation and understanding
Speaker 2: of the world around us. We advance in knowledge of
Speaker 2: the things in our environments incrementally, a little bit at
Speaker 2: a time, allowing us to see and experience the real
Speaker 2: world in advancing degrees of complexity. It's how we learn
Speaker 2: the good in the world and the harsh realities of
Speaker 2: the same space. This first story is a prime example
Speaker 2: of what can happen when you least expected. It's a
Speaker 2: discussion as mentors, a responsibility to make our young ones
Speaker 2: know parents can prepare them for everything, and when they're
Speaker 2: out of our reach, they have to be.
Speaker 1: Prepared for anything.
Speaker 2: It's a little heavy, but I think it's important, and
Speaker 2: we'll finish up with a celebration, but before we do,
Speaker 2: I'm going to tell you the story. This one comes
Speaker 2: from Ken Nysley. Ken's from New Holland, Pennsylvania, and he
Speaker 2: shared the following story. I think it says a lot
Speaker 2: on many different levels, but I'm gonna let you decide
Speaker 2: for yourself what it all says without any bias from
Speaker 2: me to begin with.
Speaker 1: So, in Ken's word, in my voice, here we go.
Speaker 2: Sometimes in life it feels like the Good Lord has
Speaker 2: a way of shining down on you, or maybe it's
Speaker 2: just plain.
Speaker 1: Luck that comes your way when you least expected.
Speaker 2: I was the oldest child in a family where my
Speaker 2: father didn't hunt, and that was a heavy burden to bear.
Speaker 2: I often thought it was one of the most unfair
Speaker 2: things life had helped me. While my friends boasted about
Speaker 2: their fathers taking them hunting and flowning their trophies with
Speaker 2: deer hanging proudly from the meadpoles, I was left to
Speaker 2: stew and jealousy. Growing up on a chicken farm, my
Speaker 2: days were filled with gathering eggs and feeding the animals,
Speaker 2: and from what seemed like from dawn till dusk, I
Speaker 2: longed for the.
Speaker 1: Thrill of the hunt.
Speaker 2: The chance to roam the woods and discover the wild
Speaker 2: life didn't seem fair, not one little bit, And as
Speaker 2: a boy of fourteen or fifteen, I felt that burning
Speaker 2: desire to learn the ways of hunting, to step into
Speaker 2: that world that seems so tantalizingly out of reach. I
Speaker 2: had my father's old twenty two it's made in nineteen
Speaker 2: o six to keep the squirrels and the blue jays
Speaker 2: away from the cowd trees, but I yearned for something more.
Speaker 2: The azer came from my cousin Ernie, a farm boy
Speaker 2: like me, a few years older, with similar daily responsibilities.
Speaker 2: But Ernie had found a way to slip away from
Speaker 2: the farm into those magical woods, chasing after whitetail. Before long,
Speaker 2: he gathered us cousins with fathers who didn't hunt, and
Speaker 2: began teaching.
Speaker 1: Us the ropes.
Speaker 2: He showed us our first rubs and how to spot
Speaker 2: the markings on saplings. Ernie taught us about scrapes and
Speaker 2: trails and tracks, and how to decipher the droppings, and
Speaker 2: how to watch the wind figure out where that buck
Speaker 2: might cross our path. We put in the time, scouted,
Speaker 2: and rose early to drive to our hunting spots, but
Speaker 2: success didn't come as easily as out hope. For Ernie,
Speaker 2: it seemed very He backed a ten corner on opening day,
Speaker 2: and my heart burned with a fierce desire to following
Speaker 2: his footsteps. I had to get my first deer, but
Speaker 2: it felt like such a distant dream. One day, Ernie
Speaker 2: shared the news that he got permission to hunt a
Speaker 2: farm forty five minutes away, a place that held the
Speaker 2: promise of adventure. So early one Saturday morning, Ernie, our
Speaker 2: cousin Butch, and I set off the air crisped with anticipation.
Speaker 2: Ernie guided me off the dirt lane is flashlight dancing
Speaker 2: among the trees. He told me to find a tree
Speaker 2: and climb up, and I felt the thrill of excitement
Speaker 2: as I hoisted that Baker's style tree stand up the trunk,
Speaker 2: hugging that tree tightly as I climbed higher and higher
Speaker 2: until I found my perch.
Speaker 1: Sounds effortless, but it wasn't. He had to shut your
Speaker 1: brain off.
Speaker 2: What was happening to your chest as you did your
Speaker 2: aerobics in that tree, climbing up higher and higher. And
Speaker 2: it was normal back then for me to have bruised
Speaker 2: and scraped up chest during hunting season. Once I got settled,
Speaker 2: I pulled my remy till eight seventy up with me,
Speaker 2: I loaded it and I sat in silence, watching the
Speaker 2: world awaken around me. Time seemed to stretch as I
Speaker 2: watched squirrels, and then a dough stepped into view. My
Speaker 2: heart raised as I raised my shotgun, I squeezed the trigger,
Speaker 2: and I watched her bolt a mere ten yards before
Speaker 2: falling over. And at that moment I transformed from a
Speaker 2: boy waiting for his chance to become a triumphant hunter
Speaker 2: to finally claiming my first deer. Now, after the season closed,
Speaker 2: Ernie and I began planning for next year. We returned
Speaker 2: to the public land we had hunted the year before,
Speaker 2: but look it eluded me. Weekend after weekend we hunted,
Speaker 2: but deer number two was nowhere to be found. And
Speaker 2: then Ernie mentioned that farm, the same place that had
Speaker 2: brought me good fortune the year before, and with a
Speaker 2: flicker of hope, I agreed. So once more we set
Speaker 2: off of that familiar place, and I found myself climbing
Speaker 2: the same tree one year later. Little did I know
Speaker 2: that that day would test my very being and make
Speaker 2: me question whether I ever.
Speaker 1: Wanted to hunt again. At daybreak, several doors wandered into
Speaker 1: the clearing. I raised my age seventy.
Speaker 2: I aimed carefully and I shot, and the deer took off,
Speaker 2: and I shot again, and to my surprise, one of
Speaker 2: them fell. Now I already had taught me that you
Speaker 2: need to wait awhile before you get down from your
Speaker 2: tree to give the animal time to expire. But I
Speaker 2: could see from my perch that that dough I shot
Speaker 2: was trying but unable to get up and needed to
Speaker 2: be finished off. I had two shells left, and I
Speaker 2: made the choice to use my next last shell, and
Speaker 2: I needed to do it quickly, and I climbed down
Speaker 2: and I walked up and I did what had to
Speaker 2: be done.
Speaker 1: But a heavy weight replaced the.
Speaker 2: Joy in my heart, as I did not want that
Speaker 2: animal to suffer. We dragged that deer back to the truck,
Speaker 2: and as we drove towards the store that was also
Speaker 2: a check station, I continued to fight with queasiness and
Speaker 2: feel good, and the unease settled deep within me. My
Speaker 2: cousins debated whether to grab hot dogs and drinks, and
Speaker 2: it was all I could do to shake the queasiness
Speaker 2: that crept into my stomach image of that deer struggling
Speaker 2: as I approached it that it haunted me, and I
Speaker 2: knew what I had done was necessary, but bothered me.
Speaker 2: The thrill of the hunt had soured, and I wondered
Speaker 2: if I was cut out for this life.
Speaker 1: As we pulled into the.
Speaker 2: Parking lot, another truck roared in beside, his tires screeching
Speaker 2: on the pavement. The driver swung open his door as
Speaker 2: I stepped out on the pastor's side. To my shocking heart,
Speaker 2: I saw his window explode in.
Speaker 1: A shower of glass.
Speaker 2: It rained like confetti all around our feet, and my
Speaker 2: heart raised as I went on high alert. What I
Speaker 2: saw next rashed it up the turmoil of my stomach considerably,
Speaker 2: and blood ran down the man's face. And this wasn't
Speaker 2: a sight encountered where I lived. But what happened next
Speaker 2: was even more serric. He locked eyes with me, and
Speaker 2: before I knew it, he grabbed me, wrapping his arms
Speaker 2: around me and shaking me fiercely. His breath came in
Speaker 2: ragged gasp as he uttered the words that would forever
Speaker 2: be etched in my memory. Take me to Greenwood, Take
Speaker 2: me to the hospital. That boy of mine unshot me
Speaker 2: and my wife. In that instant, my sixteen year old
Speaker 2: mine went into overdrive, spinning wildly on the gravel in
Speaker 2: my brain, and I stood frozen and grappling with the
Speaker 2: reality of what I was seeing and experiencing physically. And
Speaker 2: then a bystander came rushing up, claiming he knew the
Speaker 2: injured man and he would take him for help. Washed
Speaker 2: over me as he let go and climbed into the
Speaker 2: other man's vehicle. The grim reality of that morning waenthed
Speaker 2: heavily on me, and as we pieced together the story,
Speaker 2: we learned that the man's son had shot at his truck.
Speaker 2: A tiny hole in the passenger side window told the tale,
Speaker 2: and the bullet grazed his face. It was one lucky man,
Speaker 2: but it seemed like I was one unlucky boy. The
Speaker 2: beauty of that morning, with its crisp bear and the
Speaker 2: promise of adventure, had been shattered in an instant. I
Speaker 2: returned home that day with more than just a deer
Speaker 2: in the back of the truck. I carried the weight
Speaker 2: of a harsh lesson. Learned the thrill of the hunt
Speaker 2: had been tainted by the harsh realities of life and death,
Speaker 2: and I questioned whether I could ever enjoy it again.
Speaker 2: And yet as time passed, I came to understand that
Speaker 2: hunting is a part of life, life and a life
Speaker 2: that is often unpredictable and filled with both joy, sorrow
Speaker 2: and unpredictability. It's been forty four years since that day.
Speaker 2: In every fall, I still find myself wondering the woods,
Speaker 2: feeling the pull of nature and the thrill of the hunt.
Speaker 2: Every now and then, my mind drifts back to that
Speaker 2: faithful day when a young boy faced the harsh realities
Speaker 2: of the world.
Speaker 1: And it was a.
Speaker 2: Hard lesson, but it helped the shape be into the
Speaker 2: hunter and a man I am today. I've learned to
Speaker 2: embrace the experience and a camaraderie with family and friends,
Speaker 2: and respect for the life that sustains us all. And
Speaker 2: according to Ken Nicely, that's just how that happened. Now
Speaker 2: in this episode, I'm talking about our young ones, maturity
Speaker 2: and moving about out of our direct control. And there's
Speaker 2: so many things within Ken's story that it spoke Jimmy.
Speaker 1: His passion for.
Speaker 2: The outdoors, his respect for wildlife, his duty and responsibility
Speaker 2: as an ethical hunter, and as a young man caught
Speaker 2: in a situation beyond his control. All things that we
Speaker 2: can influence as parents. If something like that can happen
Speaker 2: in the middle of rural Pennsylvania, it can happen anywhere.
Speaker 2: And while we can't and shouldn't live in fear, we
Speaker 2: have to remain ever vigilant. That's a lesson for any age.
Speaker 1: Thanks for sharing.
Speaker 2: Ken May is a transition month, and where I live,
Speaker 2: spring is beginning to give way to summer. Turkey hunting
Speaker 2: activity starts tapering off Yearling bear cubs begin looking for
Speaker 2: their own space, and high school seniors say goodbye to
Speaker 2: one way of life.
Speaker 1: And they'll load to another. Twelve years is a long time,
Speaker 1: thirteen if you count kindergarten, and how could you not.
Speaker 1: For many of us, it was the end of a
Speaker 1: different era as well as the beginning of a new one.
Speaker 1: Work for many families these days is a husband and
Speaker 1: wife partnership. The days of housewives and stay at home
Speaker 1: moms are now the exception to the rule, when only
Speaker 1: a generation or so ago it was the standard. Things change.
Speaker 1: I get it.
Speaker 2: They have to change in order for us to progress,
Speaker 2: and I'm not big on change, but don't misunderstand me.
Speaker 2: I'm not advocating for moms, wives, husbands, or dads to
Speaker 2: stay at home. I'm merely pointing out the fact that
Speaker 2: things change. We lived in Star City, Arkansas for a
Speaker 2: short period of time. This was before I started school
Speaker 2: and rising. My mama didn't work then, and I remember
Speaker 2: going outside to get milk and butter off the steps
Speaker 2: early in the mornings with her that the milkman had
Speaker 2: delivered way before daylight. I spent all day with her
Speaker 2: every day and would until I started kindergarten.
Speaker 1: When I did, I didn't want to go.
Speaker 2: Everything I knew and was familiar with was there within
Speaker 2: the confines of her companionship and our routine. That was
Speaker 2: safety and security and all the things I associated with
Speaker 2: living Unnaturally, one wouldn't want.
Speaker 1: To deviate from that routine.
Speaker 2: But the big yellow bus, in the case of all
Speaker 2: younguns growing up in the country, when I did, waited
Speaker 2: for us all.
Speaker 1: There was no escape.
Speaker 2: At some point during my sixty year of life, I
Speaker 2: had to get on the biggest conveyance I'd ever seen
Speaker 2: and trust the driver with my life and my schedule.
Speaker 2: On top of all that, my Mama made me get
Speaker 2: on it, and I felt a trade you have to
Speaker 2: go to school, Brent, a phrase that would be repeated
Speaker 2: to me by her for the next twelve years. Range
Speaker 2: us back to what I started this oration out with
Speaker 2: five paragraphs ago, the month of May. The past few
Speaker 2: weeks on social media has been full of pictures of
Speaker 2: a child's last time in whatever grade they're in, each
Speaker 2: parent announcing the pride and the milestones that their kids
Speaker 2: are carrying out. But it's the parents of the seniors
Speaker 2: that get most of my attention. I'm glad my mama
Speaker 2: didn't have Facebook back when I was in school. Her
Speaker 2: post would have been something like, can't believe Brent got
Speaker 2: out of the sixth grade without going to prison. Here's
Speaker 2: to a great summer a Lenia judge and juvenile probation.
Speaker 2: Not really, but it could have been. There's a lot
Speaker 2: to unpack for those parents and students, regardless of if
Speaker 2: it's the first time for each or just another in
Speaker 2: a succession of graduating offspring. It's hard thing to do,
Speaker 2: at least it was for me on both ends. Yet
Speaker 2: it is the natural progression in life. For eighteen years,
Speaker 2: we nurture and train, to teach discipline and provide the
Speaker 2: foundation for our children. To function in society, to take
Speaker 2: care of themselves, and hopefully become an asset to the
Speaker 2: community of humans inhabiting this spending over confusion that we
Speaker 2: all share. I think back to what it was like
Speaker 2: when my oldest graduated that time. My youngest wasn't even
Speaker 2: born yet. Now I cried like a baby. I ain't
Speaker 2: vaccinated against squalling about it now just thinking about it.
Speaker 2: And my oldest daughter, Aimy, graduated sixteen years ago. I've
Speaker 2: never wanted any of them to leave, but I also
Speaker 2: know that that's not how it works, or should work.
Speaker 2: I was one of them at one time, and I
Speaker 2: couldn't wait to get out on my own. The excitement
Speaker 2: and the anxiousness of the future and seeing what was
Speaker 2: just over the next hill is how we got to
Speaker 2: this country in the beginning. It's also how the folks
Speaker 2: that were already here called smallpox and ran out of Buffalo.
Speaker 2: Good and bad in everything. Growing up and growing older,
Speaker 2: it's no different. I worked in the woods for different
Speaker 2: forestry concerns until I became old enough to work in
Speaker 2: law enforcement, the career I chosen for myself in elementary school,
Speaker 2: when I realized I couldn't grow up to be a
Speaker 2: mountain man or a Hollywood stunt man. Now, thirty three
Speaker 2: years of police work later, I'm not sure that stunt
Speaker 2: man things didn't actually work out.
Speaker 1: It sure feels like it sometimes.
Speaker 2: My parents did all they could do to prepare me
Speaker 2: for life outside the nest. My teachers and coaches, several
Speaker 2: of whom I've mentioned on here, did the same, and
Speaker 2: I didn't pay much attention to any of them. My
Speaker 2: life had been a mission of fun to that point,
Speaker 2: with nothing else really mattering, and tomorrow would always be tomorrow.
Speaker 2: There's always time when you're young and getting older and
Speaker 2: growing up with something you wished for but never realized.
Speaker 2: It was like Christmas and getting the driver's license, or
Speaker 2: going on a first date, hanging out uptown on the
Speaker 2: weekends on Friday and Saturday night. It would take forever
Speaker 2: for those times to get here, but when they finally did, man,
Speaker 2: we're going to have fun forever and it will never end.
Speaker 2: And then it gets here the keys to the family car,
Speaker 2: a curfew and a little spending money. Two years from now,
Speaker 2: I'll graduate high school and then it's worker college. Either way,
Speaker 2: that's two years and forever away.
Speaker 1: But it's not in the blink of an eye, it's over.
Speaker 2: Even when I found myself filling out graduation announcements and
Speaker 2: staring straight down the double barrel shotgun of reality, it
Speaker 2: seemed like there was always time until there was I've
Speaker 2: seen that look on some parents' faces over the past
Speaker 2: few weeks, perients in my family and those of family
Speaker 2: friends who were seemingly changing diapers one day and schedule
Speaker 2: in college and trade school visits the next. Now I've
Speaker 2: done it twice myself in two thousand and nine and
Speaker 2: two thousand and sixteen. I have one more to go.
Speaker 2: Six years from now. Six years fifty two thousand, five
Speaker 2: hundred and sixty hours, two thousand, one hundred and ninety
Speaker 2: one days. Now, that would be a long time to
Speaker 2: be in jail, a long time to work at a
Speaker 2: job that you didn't like, and an even longer time
Speaker 2: to be sick. But the last six years of having
Speaker 2: your child at home, Man, it burns by so quick
Speaker 2: you can't even smell the smoke. At the end of
Speaker 2: the next six years, my baby girl Bailey and my
Speaker 2: oldest granddaughter Piper will graduate high school the same year,
Speaker 2: and I may need medication. Six may be the most
Speaker 2: important six years in preparation for the rest of their lives,
Speaker 2: and I would argue that anyway, this was a critical
Speaker 2: time for me and how I saw the world, or
Speaker 2: in all actuality, I didn't see it. I relied on
Speaker 2: manners and charming my teachers to get me through school
Speaker 2: and studying, and half the effort I put towards football
Speaker 2: and everything else. But school would have served me well
Speaker 2: beyond furthering my education. I didn't know how to study.
Speaker 2: I could halfway pay attention in class, do well enough
Speaker 2: to pass, and keep my grades good enough to stay
Speaker 2: in sports and keep my mother at bay. I saw
Speaker 2: the same thing in my son, Hunter, who I never
Speaker 2: saw crack a book all during high school, and he
Speaker 2: graduated near the top of his class of nearly a
Speaker 2: thousand students, only a few tenths of a point away
Speaker 2: from perfection. But even he got slapped in the face
Speaker 2: with a had radic reality when he got to college
Speaker 2: by not being prepared on out of study. Alexis warned him,
Speaker 2: college is going to be different, Bubba. He had to
Speaker 2: scramble and teach himself how to do that all on
Speaker 2: his own.
Speaker 1: But he did it. But it wasn't easy.
Speaker 2: The fact is that's all different, college work, making a
Speaker 2: life for yourself, whatever it is they choose to do
Speaker 2: at Our job from the moment we bring them home
Speaker 2: from the hospital is to prepare them for the last
Speaker 2: time they walk out the door. Is our possessions. It's
Speaker 2: not our job to prepare the world for our children.
Speaker 2: It's to prepare our children for the world. When the
Speaker 2: opposite of that is the easiest, running interference, fighting their battles,
Speaker 2: letting them win, and ignoring the negatives makes for a
Speaker 2: happier child, but a sadder adult because reality is cruel
Speaker 2: and it spares no one. Alexis and I won't Bailey
Speaker 2: to succeed in everything she does, but we also know,
Speaker 2: as hard as it is to watch, that she has
Speaker 2: to fail and experience loss. The lesson, then, is how
Speaker 2: she deals with it, and that's our job. Accepting loss
Speaker 2: and using it to learn and get better is the
Speaker 2: only way you learn and get better. That's how we
Speaker 2: prepare her for the times when we're not there, and
Speaker 2: the decisions that she makes, good or bad, and how
Speaker 2: she reacts to the outcomes rest on how we've prepared
Speaker 2: her for those moments. Being humble and triumph and gracious
Speaker 2: and loss. Both of those are hard to do, and
Speaker 2: I don't know which is harder. I'm no shining example
Speaker 2: of either. What I am is barely intelligent enough to
Speaker 2: realize how much better I would be as a man
Speaker 2: of faith, husband, father, a brother, and a friend if
Speaker 2: I was. And that's the best thing that we can
Speaker 2: do for our children in the community in which they live,
Speaker 2: is to teach them not to be like us, but
Speaker 2: to be like what we wish we were and want
Speaker 2: them to be. Last weekend, our little family spent Saturday
Speaker 2: and Sunday eating barbecue and crawfish, celebrating two graduates from
Speaker 2: our circle of friends who are just like our family.
Speaker 2: Two high school seniors, Trevor and Savannah, sweethearts all through school,
Speaker 2: both shining examples of what a young lady and a
Speaker 2: young man would be if nineteen fifties Hollywood had.
Speaker 1: Written them as a TV show. Neither of them related
Speaker 1: to me by blood.
Speaker 2: Our closest relative would probably be Adam and Eve, but
Speaker 2: they are my family by choice, and in the last
Speaker 2: couple of years, I've watched them and how they interact
Speaker 2: with adults, their siblings, the friends of their siblings, and
Speaker 2: they not only restored my hope for the future.
Speaker 1: When Bailey and.
Speaker 2: Piper reached that age, they help restore or my faith
Speaker 2: that there have to be others just like the ones
Speaker 2: the news outlets don't cover or talk about, the ones
Speaker 2: you never hear from, because that's not news these days,
Speaker 2: and the prime reason I don't watch it. I saw
Speaker 2: all the news I needed this weekend, trying to stay
Speaker 2: in the shade in front of a fan while we
Speaker 2: laughed at pictures of our two seniors, baby pictures, and
Speaker 2: some from six years ago, the age Bailey is now,
Speaker 2: and six years from now, the majority of the people
Speaker 2: I spent Saturday and Sunday with will gather again to
Speaker 2: celebrate her and her friends. It is a day I
Speaker 2: dread and look forward to, all at the same time.
Speaker 2: Later this summer, Trevor and Savannah will move off to college,
Speaker 2: and for a while we'll be sad they're gone, and
Speaker 2: then it will be just a part of life as
Speaker 2: we all settle into the new routine of their absence.
Speaker 2: If we have done our jobs, we will have prepared
Speaker 2: our children on how to survive without us. Unfortunately, no
Speaker 2: one gives us lessons on how to survive without them.
Speaker 2: We have to take comfort that we've done our best
Speaker 2: that we can, and we pray for them and trust
Speaker 2: that they listened, even if only remotely better than I did.
Speaker 1: Good luck to all of you. Whether it's college, trade schools, military,
Speaker 1: or straight to work. We're counting on you and we
Speaker 1: believe in.
Speaker 2: And thanks to all of you who have joined us
Speaker 2: here on the Bear Grease channel each week. Clay and
Speaker 2: I appreciate it, and we appreciate it very much.
Speaker 1: Until next week. This is Brent Reeves signing off. Y'all
Speaker 1: be careful