00:00:05 Speaker 1: Welcome to This Country Life. I'm your host, Brent Reeves from coon hunting to trot lining and just general country living. I want you to stay a while as I share my experiences in life lessons. This Country Life is presented by Case Knives on Meat Eaters Podcast Network, bringing you the best outdoor podcast the airwaves have to offer. All right, friends, grab a chair or drop that tailgate. I've got some stories to share. A first and last, A first and last, the beginning in the end. If there is a start to anything, there will most definitely always be an end. We can plan for the beginning, but the end is hardly ever known. From a first world hunt to a last deer hunt, we never know when they'll end, but we hope that the last one will be as memorable as the first. I've got what I believe are great examples of each and I'm going to share them with you now, starting with this story. There are four states in the US that refer to themselves as Commonwealth states, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, the home of this country Life listener who shared the following narrative from forty four years ago. So when his words in my voice. Here we go. My name is Howard Howie Toler from Bluefield, Virginia. My story takes us back to nineteen eighty when I was ten and October was quickly approaching, and I was eagerly awaiting the time to come when my dad, my uncle, older cousins hitch up my dad's camper to the white jeep grand Wagoneer with wood grain panels and head out to Greenbrier County, West Virginia for my first squirrel hunting trip. I've been hearing the guys telling their hunting tales for as long as I could remember, and I absolutely could not wait to get out in the woods. I remember being on the top bunk. I thought I had won the toss and got the best sleeping position, but I was soon reminded that heat and the exhaust of the other guys following chilly with beans for dinner, rises and hangs out right on top with me, and being a camper, there were only a few valuable inches of airspace between my nose and the ceiling. I certainly didn't I get much sleep that night before opening. The morning excitement and the strange smells and lack of sounds except for the occasional acron bouncing off the roof of our camper kept me from getting much more than a few non consecutive hours of sleep. Bout the time I got good and asleep, the mallet on that old wind up alarm clock started banging away at its two bells. Someone, and I'm not sure who, smacked that obnoxious clock and bounced it off the wall, putting an abrupt end to all the racket. Now I shot up, I sung the covers off, and I swear it seemed like I had my boots on before it hit the floor. Everyone was squeezing past each other in the narrow camper, stepping over boxes and duffel bags, trying to get dressed, getting the day's snacks packed, and slurped down a cup of coffee. Except Dad. He just laid in his bunk, looking at his foot that was sticking out from under the cover. Two things to know about my dad. Everyone called him Fudd, and because of an unfortunate accident in the coal mine, he had only nine toes. Sometime during the night someone had tied a game tag who his toe next to the one that was missing, and rode on it. Fud gone to market be back soon. It was probably the the funniest thing I had witnessed in my ten years, and Dad was quick to say it's not many people to get to see their toe tag and live the tell A Mountain. Well. Soon after me and Dad were parked on the lot, me looking uphiling him downhill. Or at least that's what he said. I had no idea because it was still dark to say I was a little uneasy sitting in the pitch black in the woods was an understanding. I was sure every twig and falling up with some unseen toothy beasts planning to make breakfast out of me. The Dad kept scooting me down, saying if I get any closer, I had to get in his pocket. Soon enough that old son did what it does and started to rise above the ridge. I got my first looks at where I'd been sitting, and even though it was really no different than the woods I played in behind the house, I was certain that our four feet were the only ones to ever leave tracks in that portion of the wilderness. And even though that wagoneer that we had rode in on was within sight just to hundred yards away, it was shooting like now Dad pulled out a three inch number five four to ten shell from his pocket and told me to load up, but don't close the breech on my single shot. We sat there on that log for what seemed like days but was probably only an hour or so, and Dad reached over and took the shell from my gun and told me come on, close her up. And we stood up, and I snapped the four tenth closed, and I followed him over the ridge to another spot, where we repeated the process of finding the log and looking in the office of directions again, not so much as a chipmunk made an appearance. My dreams of shooting herds the squirrels from the tree off were quickly fading and bored them cold, and my butt getting numb on that damp log started setting in. By now it was close to time to head back to camp for lunch. I think my dad knew I was losing a little my excitement, so since we were leaving anyway, we found an old vial in the sausage can, stuck it on the branch and stepped off a few paces, added me a shell. Let me shoot my gun and kill that camp. I was glad to do it. We headed back to camp, and after lunch, Dad knew another place where he had found squirrel cuttings under some hickory trees. We parked ourselves on another log, looked in the opposite directions again, and I got my shell in my open breach. Four to ten and I'm ready. I was beginning to question repeating this same approach to squirrel hunting. Walk and sit, walk and sit, walk and sit. My thoughts were wondering where everything ten year old boys ponder on, namely Daisy duke, and watch that weird bug? And can't I squish it with a stick that I'm playing with. I pretty much giving up on looking for squirrels and basically just keeping Dad company while he hunted. Suddenly, a flash of movement and a tree caught my attention. I'm thinking, sesh, another stupid bird. Ain't gonna minute. That bird has a fuzzy tail, be Dad, it was a squirrel. Dad slowly glanced over his shoulder and began scanning to locate what I was seeing, and in short order he locked on Son, get ready, that's a big one at a snail's pace. He swung his legs over that log and it was now facing the same direction as me. We watched and waited while that squirrel worked its way closer and in de range and my shotgun. Finally it was close enough and stopped while it sat in the crotch of a limb on a tree, just nibbling at a hick or none. Dad said, go ahead and shoot, and for whatever reason, I stood up and got down on one knee like I was going to ask that squirrel to marry me. I rolled the hammer back, I settled the bead, and bang. I recovered from the shot, and my squirrel was still where it was when I shot, only now it was on the trunk, pointing upward toward the kenomy. Dad handed me another shell, but that squirrel lost his grip and fell with a thud walking up. I knew it was a whopper of a fox squirrel, but it wasn't dead. Dad got it by the tail and entered it suffering by swinging it and thumping its head on a tree. I was a little shocked by the violence of it all, and I remember feeling slightly guilty for what we just did. Now. Later on, my dad remarked that if there ever comes a time when you don't have a little remorse for taking a life. It's time to quit hunting. We got back to camp first, and I couldn't wait for the others to make it back so I could show off my price. Soon enough, everyone started straggling in. I had it all planned out. I'd wait for everyone to get back, and when they all pulled up today's squirrels and began the cleaning process, I'd throw my whopper down on top of the pile and soak in all the adulations in the backslaps. And just like I planned, my uncle cousins had a pile of gray squirrels and on wase a nice fox squirrel that they were proud of. Everyone was telling the stories of how their squirrels came to be in the game vest Now they just commenced to clean the squirrels when I walked up and dropped mine on top of the pile like an old West gambler throwing down a straight flush, and said, bam, boys, sure enough, the holy cows, the good gullies, and the way that goes started just like I planned, and I finally had a hunting tale to share. Now that old fox squirrel ended up in a pot with dumplings, and Dad always regretted not having that squirrel mounted for me, but I never really cared that he didn't. I had a memory and a tale to tale that has stayed with me for nearly forty five years. I had more adventures and taking bigger and better game, but that fox squirrel back in nineteen eighty is my favorite memory. Dad and my uncle are gone now, but they are with me every opening morning the squirrel season, and sometimes I'll chuckle out loud thinking about Dad's to tag and a note from the little piggy went to market. And according to Howie Toller of Bluefield, Virginia, that's just how that happened, now, how We included a picture of that day of him, a skinny ten year old boy, his dad, a pile of squirrels on the ground, a normal sized fox squirrel in his left hand, and trophy in his right that's as big as a small child. Thanks for sharing, Howie. If you're interested in seeing that picture, check out my Instagram. It was open the day of gun deer season in Arkansas over twenty years ago, and I was working uniform patrol as a lieutenant and the day shift supervisor. My sheriff was deer hunting, my major was deer hunting, and the Captain was deer hunting. They were all only a phone called away from working, but if nothing happened, they would only see the reports about what took place in their absence. So why was I working on opening Day? Well, I just answered my own question. All the admin folks were off. The standard operating procedure was anything that happened requiring additional personnel to be called out, like CID or narcotics or the coroner. My immediate supervisor would have to be notified, and then he would determine if it was to be passed on up the chain of command and so on. Also, I was leading by example and showing the deputies in my charge that I was willing to work so one of them could enjoy the on set of firearm season at their family's camp. It was an excellent example of leadership. It was also a testament of my misreading the schedule weeks before when that deputy had put in for his request to be off duty. Nice job, Stephen Vestel. Anyway, there I was working when I didn't have to, and on a day when I didn't have to, I wanted to be off hunting with my but it would turn out to be one of the best days at work ever, not the best, but ride up there close the day that stands out in the top ten percent of a thirty two year career. Of that in itself speaks volumes of how it affected one singular event out of literally thousands of interactions that to this day. When someone asks for a story, this one comes to mind, but I seldom tell it, not because I don't think they'll appreciate it, because I don't know if they'll appreciate it enough. Besides, most folks only want to hear the stories when someone winds up not being amongst the living before it's overwhet. Those are the ones that I wish I could forget, the ones that I don't talk about unless it's to someone who was there in a setting where folks that weren't can't hear us, and even then no details, usually just to pass and mention of remember such and such, Yep, that was a bad one, and then we go on we talk about something else, but I think about them often. Then there's this story, and it's one where someone passes away and you hear it in a few moments, and if you see it in your head the way I saw it that day, I think you'll agree. Why it's not one that I choose to share in the idle conversation deserves some reverence. I wrote this today. It happened when I got off work. I would eventually find out that all my assumptions in the text of the story proved to be true. So clear your mind and walk with you. Here we go. I didn't know the old man. I had never met him or even heard his name before when they told me who he was. But I'll never forget him. The old man's obituary, we'll read that he was in his eighties and that a wife, chill, and grandchildren survive him. It may mention that he was a veteran of World War Two and was retired after a long career in a mundane job somewhere that he worked to provide for his family for the majority of his adult life. It may even remark that the old man was an outdoorsman. But they'll never be able to convey on a pamphlet handed out by an emphatically somber suit wearing funeral director the way that old man went to Heaven. I know. I know because I was fortunate enough to be able to see what the old man saw. The call came out from dispatch to meet up with a reporting party at a deer camp in a rural portion of the county. The ten coach she relayed to me over the radio was one that meant there was an unattended death, Someone had died alone. I was in that district and answered the call this morning and met with one of the camp members who would lead me to the place with the the old man was. I got there, and I walked the short distance to where the old man had been hunting out behind the camp. The sky was clear and the sun was shining through the trees and the little oak flat where his ground blind was. The air was crisp and just cold enough to stay warm wearing a jacket if you were moving around, or if you were sitting a thick wool lined antiquated canvas coat like the old man had on. A short distance away was a lean up stand that the members of his camp had told me that they convinced him to abandon in his failing health. One of the members built the ground blind that faced this little flat where the cool breeze blew water oak leaves from their limbs. They rustled around like ripples in a pond, settling into a patchwork of sunlight that dotted the area where we stood. There was a small buck scrape in front of a blind, and a few small red oaks that showed signs of where a bucket recently rubbed his arms. Beside the blind was a browning rifle leaned against an oak tree. The rifle was old but immaculate. The bluing was worn, and there was a few scratches here and there, but one could see that this rifle belonged to a hunter. Maybe the old man carried a different rifle many years ago when he served our country. I don't know, but you can bet that if he did carry one, it was kept just as clean as this one. A short distance in front of the blind lay a buck that was dropped in his tracks by an old man using this old rifle. And laying beside the deer was the old man. The deer had been expertly feel dressed by someone who had done it more than once, and among the old man's few possessions inventory from his clothes was an old man's pocket knife stained with the blood from his latest and last deer, A single blade trapper sharp as a razor, the blade thin from many trips up and down a wet rock. I held it in my hand, and I saw the pocket war that had rented, the logo, almost unreadable, and the scales slick and polished from years of being carried in his pocket, but immediately recognizable as to what it was to anyone in my circle. I imagine the old man sitting at the campfire at night, telling stories or listening to him while he drank coffee and sharpened his knife. Now I feel like he saw heaven twice that day, the first time around nine fifteen in a little oak flat where his body rested when I first saw him. Nine point fifteen was the time recorded by the old man on the tag that hung from the bucks antlers. The second time he saw heaven was a short time afterward, when he walked the wooded trail home to be with his maker. What a beautiful day, in a beautiful way to go to Heaven. I think about that day now, over twenty years later, and while I know there are folks who I'm sure still mourn the loss of the old man. I feel privileged to have been there as a witness to his last act of being as close to creation as one could be while living, And then a moment later, beside the one that created it, he'd accomplished what he loved to do. He filled his final tag in a place he'd hunted all his life, the place he loved the most, And when he finished the field work, he put everything in his place and laid down to rest forever his heart for over eighty years, faithfully matching the pace of his life, that simply played out, And that was the end. That was the last. You know. I shared that story on a private hunting group form from back in the day, right after it happened, and when you know it, a friend of a friend of mine saw it and shared it with the old man's family. A week or so after his passing. They reached out to me and thanked me and told me they took great comfort in hearing how I had interpreted the old man's last morning. I'll never forget it, And as I sit here now, I can still hear the cool wind and the rustle of the leaves as they tumbled across the ground, and feel the peace that was around us all that November morning. Thank y'all so much for listening. It is my absolute pleasure to bring these stories to you each week and share them with you. Keep sharing and spreading the word Old Clayboa and I appreciate it very much. Until next week, this is Brent Reeve signing off. Y'all be careful, King,