M&M&HP (cont.)

[Guest guest]

III. READY. OR NOT.

 

 

As I said, all this seemed much less crazy to me after I'd been in

the woods that first morning with my gun, long before I even had

occasion to fire it. I'm chagrined to report that the occasion never

presented itself during that first hunting trip — or rather, when it

did present itself I was in no position to do anything about it. I

know, I've been talking here like Mister Big Game Hunter, comparing

notes on the experience with the likes of Señor Ortega y Gasset, but

I returned from the woods that day not only empty-handed, which in

hunting is entirely forgivable, but also what is not, having failed

as a hunter because I was not ready.

 

I blame this, at least partly, on lunch.

 

By the end of the morning, one animal had been shot, a small boar,

taken by Jean-Pierre. On our way back up to the ridge in the A.T.V.,

Angelo and I picked it up. Not a whole lot bigger than a beagle, it

had a florid blotch erupting from the side of its bristly black head.

Angelo hung it by its ankles from the limb of a tree near the cars;

he planned to dress it after lunch.

 

Being Europeans, as well as accomplished cooks, Angelo and Jean-

Pierre take lunch very seriously, even when out in the woods some

distance from civilization. " So I brought with me a few little things

to nibble on, " Jean-Pierre mumbled. " Me, too, " chimed Angelo. And out

of their packs came course after course of the most astonishing

picnic, which they proceeded to lay out on the hood of Angelo's

S.U.V.: a terrine of lobster and halibut en geleé, salami and

prosciutto and mortadella, Angelo's homemade pâté of boar and home-

cured olives, cornichons, chicken salad, a generous selection of

cheeses and breads, fresh strawberries and pastries, silverware and

napkins and, naturally, a bottle each of red and white wine.

 

It was a delicious lunch, but arguably it took off some of my

hunter's edge. One of the easier questions on my state hunter-

education course exam went something like this: " Hunting after

drinking alcohol is an acceptable practice, true or false. " Not that

I was intoxicated, but I was feeling notably loquacious and relaxed

when Richard and I set off to look for another pig after lunch, while

Angelo dressed Jean-Pierre's pig and Jean-Pierre enjoyed a

postprandial nap in the grass. Our rifles slung over our shoulders,

we strolled down a shady trail toward a spot where Richard had once

had some luck, all the while getting acquainted and chatting about

one thing or another.

 

We were thoroughly absorbed in conversation when I happened to glance

up ahead and saw directly in front of us, not 30 yards away, several

large black shapes swimming in the shadows. There they were, four big

pigs milling beneath an oak tree, their attention fixed on the acorns

littering the path that connected us. Incredibly, they gave no sign

they'd spotted us or heard our yammering.

 

I grabbed Richard by the shoulder, put my finger to my lips and

pointed ahead. He stopped. " It's your shot, " he whispered. " Go ahead.

Take it. " It is the custom when hunting with companions that the

first shot belongs to the person who spotted the animal, perhaps in

recognition of the fact that skill in hunting is as much about

finding the game as killing it. In fact in many hunter-gatherer

societies, rights to the meat go not just to the hunter who killed

the animal but to the hunter who spotted it as well. These pigs were

mine.

 

One little problem. I had neglected to pump my rifle before we set

out on the trail. There was no bullet in the chamber, and to pump my

gun now would almost surely alert the pigs to our presence. I could

take the chance, but to do so probably meant the pigs would be on the

run by the time I was ready to shoot. I explained all this in a

whisper to Richard, whose own gun, a fancy new Finnish bolt-action

job, could be cocked with little more than a click of the little

bolt. I gave him my shot.

 

Richard got down on one knee and slowly raised his rifle to his

shoulder. I braced for the explosion, preparing to pump my gun the

moment it came; perhaps I could still get off a shot at one of the

others. Richard took his time, aiming carefully, waiting for one of

the animals to turn and offer its flank. The pigs had their heads

down, eating acorns, utterly oblivious to our presence. Then the

woods exploded. I saw a pig stagger and fall back against the

embankment, then struggle drunkenly to its feet. I pumped my rifle

but it was already too late: the other pigs were gone. Richard fired

again at the wounded pig, and it crumpled.

 

The pig, a sow weighing perhaps a hundred pounds, was too heavy to

carry, so we took turns dragging it by its rear leg up the path back

toward the cars. Angelo trotted over to see the animal, excited and

impressed and eager to hear our story. It's curious how the hunting

story takes shape in the moments after the shot, as you work through

the chaotic simultaneity of that lightning, elusive moment, trying to

tease out of the adrenaline fog something linear and comprehensible.

Even though we'd witnessed the event together, Richard and I had

taken turns carefully telling each other the story on the long march

back, rehearsing our lack of readiness, reviewing the reasons Richard

had taken the shot instead of me, trying to nail down the precise

distance and number of pigs involved, carefully unpacking the moment

and turning our shaky recollections into a consensus of fact — a

hunting story. As I watched Angelo drink in our hunting story, I

could see the disappointment bloom on his face. It had been my shot,

my pig, but I hadn't taken it.

 

" You weren't ready, " Angelo said, levelly. " In hunting you always

need to be ready. So, O.K., you learned something today. Next time

you will be ready, and you will take your shot. " He was trying hard

not to sound like the disappointed father; even so, I couldn't help

feeling like the disappointing son.

 

So what had really happened? I hadn't been ready to shoot. But why?

The practical reasons were clear; surely it had made more sense to

give my shot to Richard than to risk losing the animal. It was

because of my unselfish decision that we now had this pig. Yet maybe

there was some deeper sense in which I hadn't been ready; maybe my

failure to have a bullet in the chamber reflected some unconscious

reluctance about doing what I was asking myself to do. The fact is

I'd blown it, and I wasn't sure how deep I should go in search of an

explanation. And yet I had been, and still was, determined to shoot a

pig — I had a meal to cook, for one thing, but I was also genuinely

hungry for the experience, to learn whatever it had to teach me. So I

spent the rest of the afternoon hunting intently alone, walking the

ridge, raking the shadows for signs of pig, looking and listening as

hard as I could to will another pig out of the woods. When Angelo

announced it was time to go home, I felt deflated.

 

Jean-Pierre generously offered to give me some cuts of his pig. Since

I needed the meat for my meal, I was grateful for his offer, yet I

understood that to accept it underscored my inferior status in our

little society of hunters. To the successful hunter goes the

privilege of giving away the spoils, and I'd read a lot in the

anthropological literature suggesting just how important that

privilege was. The sheer nutritional density of meat has always made

it a precious form of social currency among hunter-gatherers. Since

the successful hunter often ends up with more meat than he or his

family can eat before it spoils, it makes good sense for him to, in

effect, bank the surplus in the bodies of other people, trading meat

for obligations and future favors. Chimps will do the same thing. Not

to say that Jean-Pierre was lording it over me or demanding anything

in return; he wasn't. But that didn't change the fact that here I

stood, on the vaguely pathetic receiving end of the alpha hunter's

meat gift. I thanked Jean-Pierre for the gift.

 

in the days after, I wasn't sure whether I needed to go hunting

again. I had my meat. And I had been hunting: I felt as if I had a

good idea what it was all about, or nearly all about — the hunter's

way of being in nature, and the way of the pigs. I'd spotted the prey

and witnessed the kill. I had a pretty good story too. And yet

everyone to whom I told it managed to remind me how unsatisfactory

the ending was. You mean you never even fired your gun? I'd violated

the Chekhovian dramatic rule: having introduced a loaded gun in Act

One, the curtain can't come down until it is fired. I might miss, but

the gun had to be fired. That at least seemed to be the narrative

imperative.

 

And then of course there was Señor Ortega y Gasset, who was not about

to accept me into the fellowship of hunters until I'd actually killed

an animal. Mere spectatorship, or " platonic " analogues of hunting

such as photography or bird-watching, don't cut it for him. Although

Ortega says one does not hunt in order to kill, he also says that one

must kill in order to have hunted. Why? For authenticity's sake. If

my venture was about taking ultimate responsibility for the animals I

eat, their deaths included, well, I hadn't done that yet, had I?

 

I e-mailed Angelo and asked him to let me know the next time he

planned to go hunting. He wrote back saying he would give me 48 hours

notice, to get ready.

 

A little more to go..........bob