| Photo Information |
Copyright: Brian Hartley (akula802)
(1099) |
| Genre: Places |
| Medium: Color |
| Date Taken: 2007-11-03 |
| Categories: Nature |
| Camera: Canon PowerShot SD600 |
| Photo Version: Original Version |
| Date Submitted: 2007-11-07 21:06 |
| Viewed: 411 |
| Points: 0 |
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| [Note Guidelines] Photographer's Note |
Well before 6:00 AM, I am ready. Layers of wool and fleece, a flashlight, a backpack full of tools and supplies, and my rifle. The coffee has been consumed, a makeshift breakfast has been eaten, and deer season is about to begin.
We pile into a pickup and take a jeep trail into the woods, finally stopping where the trail ends, at the top of a 350-foot glacial ridge deep in Crow Wing county forest.
It is still dark, and there is now some walking to do. Using my flashlight, I make my way towards my home for the day; a small platform up in a tree, on top of the ridge and looking down on Eagle Lake to the south-east.
I climb inside, arrange my supplies, take my rifle out of its case, and close my eyes for a while. When I am ready, I open them, and the world is dark and silent. The cold starts to sink in, and I try not to make a sound.
This is what I wait for all year. Hunting is about more than shooting stuff; it's a chance to spend some alone time in the forest, to reflect on the past and ponder the future. To reconnect all of the loose wires and blown fuses in the mind, to repair all of those misfiring circuits that life in modern America tends to destroy.
After a while, the sky to the East begins to glow, and soon after that, the sun starts to rise above the treeline. I can tell by this point that it's going to be a beautiful day.
At the end of the weekend, I went home with a freezer full of lean meat, and a few good stories to tell around the campfires to come. I have breathed a second wind, and given my thanks to God and to the deer, for what he has provided me.
This is the first time I've used my camera in a long while. Time has become a precious thing lately, and each day it seems that there is less and less of it. It felt good to get some shooting in.
Back at home, life has a new meaning, somehow. I love this time of year. |
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