Opening Day 2012

Aside from fleas, flies, ticks, mosquitoes, and the occasional wasp, I have never deliberately killed an animal. Yet this morning at sunrise I sat in the woods, for the second year in a row, waiting to shoot a buck. I am fairly certain this time, given the chance, I will pull that trigger. Last year I wasn't too sure if I would be able to do it, and since I never saw a buck, the question remained unanswered.

I am a meat-eater, however, and Ryan's buck fed us for a year. And it was guaranteed free range, organically fed, and artificial hormone free meat, which is more than I can say for the average anonymous slab of meat one finds in a supermarket nowadays. One must work for it, though, if you call sitting and waiting work.

So far I have seen no signs of animal life save for nuthatches, chickadees, woodpeckers of the downy, hairy, and pileated variety, and one lone blue jay. And there is a mouse that lives behind my stand. I have heard him squeak but he hasn't shown himself yet. The deer are out there, though. I have seen proof. Perhaps tomorrow.

Nothing Yet

It was snowing last night when I drove home from work. A couple of miles north of our town the snowflakes were sizable ones even, and the road was white, forcing me to slow down. I was hoping to wake up to a winter wonderland this morning but sadly no. Nothing. We are still looking at dying grass.

I really wanted some snow because this Saturday is Opening Day. The first day of gun hunting deer season. Ryan is getting more and more excited and I too am getting in the mood. Up in the UP where we work, the season is almost twice as long as in Wisconsin. "The Holy Season," they call it up there. I don't expect to see many people at work next week.

We spent last weekend tromping in the woods, getting our stands ready. I have been evicted from my spot by my husband but I was allowed to keep my stand, lovingly referred to as "the lemonade stand." It really is. I suppose if hunting doesn't work out for me, I could sell refreshments. I very much missed a beverage cart last year.

Ryan has taken back his spot. He is hoping for another big buck of course. So am I. Last year's deer fed us for a year. We are just about out of venison. Time to fill that empty spot in the freezer.

Peer Pressure

It used to be chain letters, the old fashioned, handwritten kind. I didn’t get that many because it was a lot of work, which was why I always felt pressured to continue the chain. Then it morphed into chain emails. Much easier to distribute and therefore more plentiful and more annoying. And the pressure became almost unbearable. “Send this to five of your closest friends in the next five minutes, or suffer horrible agony and death.” I decided to live a more daring life and I stopped sending the chain mails. Thankfully I survived.

Then came social media. And a new kind of pressure surfaced. “Like this and show your support for [fill in the blanks] or scroll down if you don’t care.” Or, my personal favorite: “Like this and go to Heaven, or scroll on and go to Hell.” The image to accompany these messages often shows a child suffering from a debilitating disease, a family tearfully mourning a lost loved one, or something equally horrific. Something most people do care about, even if they don’t know the person in question.

I never “Like” a post of that kind. Which means I must be a self centered, uncaring, unfeeling b*tch going straight to hell. WTF? Who posts such nonsense? And why do posts like that get hundreds of thousands of “Likes?” What is wrong with people? Don’t give in to this kind of peer pressure, kids. Because once you do, you have to “Like” the next thing, and the next, and so on and so forth. It’s all downhill from there.

Also, evidently God keeps track of our Facebook activities. If ever you needed an incentive to clean up your profiles, this is it!

Bad Mother

Lola’s room is a small one and there really isn’t enough room for everything we put in there. She is usually very good about keeping her room tidy but once friends come over to play and everything gets pulled out from the shelves, it’s hard to get it all under control again. It is simply too much for her and things steadily get worse.

Several attempts have been made to organize her room. Once she and I started that task together and I asked her to go through the great big basket with stuffed animals and get rid of the ones she doesn’t play with. Naturally, every single stuffed toy suddenly became a favorite. Watching Lola go through her collection deciding which one to do away with was like watching “Sophie’s Choice.” Gut wrenching.

About two weeks ago, Ryan and Lola went on their customary father - daughter date and I seized the opportunity to take charge of her room. Hardening my heart, I was resolved to recycle a few more toys than the childhood toys of her parents which were the only ones she had been willing to give up. Ruthlessly I went through her basket and the shelves of her room. Three garbage bags later I resurfaced.

We put up more shelves, organized everything in shiny new purple baskets, and rearranged the furniture. You can actually see the floor of her room again. I also went through all of her drawers and purged her summer clothes and the outfits she had outgrown. Walking into her room now is like a breath of fresh air. Lola loves it and has not once asked for any of the toys I got rid of.

Until last night.

Ryan has gone bow hunting with his dad and as always when he is gone, the girls have a Girls Night. This means that Lola moves into my bedroom and we watch a movie together before we go to sleep. Since I have a bigger bed, there is more room for her stuffed friends, and she usually brings a few more than the two or three that share her bed.

“Mom,” I heard her say when she was getting ready for bed. “Have you seen that white bear that I have?”

I knew exactly which bear she meant. It had not made the cut. Not wanting to confess to that right away, I pretended not to know which bear she was talking about. She showed me a three inch version of the bear I had thrown away and told me she was looking for its mother.

Oh no. I had orphaned a baby bear.

I fessed up to possibly, maybe giving its mother away (not true, I threw it away) and suggested Lola could be the little bear’s mom from now on. Big tears rolled from Lola’s eyes as she hiccupped that the little bear could not sleep without its mother. My daughter is very good when it comes to drama. I felt horrible.

So, anyone have a white bear to spare? I know a good home for it.