First, catie asked some questions about the hunting, which I’ll try to address.

Yes, I hunt other things too. I started with deer. I only originally got into bear hunting because I was taunting Murphy. See, since buying deer tags kept me from actually seeing deer for so many years, I figured that buying bear tags would do the same thing for bears. I was pretty nervous about running into one if I was out in the woods alone, and I wanted to be able to shoot one if I had to without having to deal with Fish and Game fallout.

It was that year that I ran into Don and discovered how much fun bear hunting actually was. He was pleased to find a new shooter, as he does love to get people their first bears (and their second bears too, now!) I still deer hunt; it’s much more peaceful and I like venison. I’ll also bring up my shotgun on the next trip, since Mountain Quail season is now open and I’ve been seeing them everywhere. Also very tasty animals.

catie, where I hunt is near Yosemite. We don’t let the dogs go toward the park, but we hunt to the northwest and southwest of it. This bear came from between Cherry Lake and the Tuolumne River, north of Highway 120. You’ve probably driven through the main highway, unless you go to the park through the southern route.

I didn’t want to waste the meat, but Wild Man was out working in the fields last night and couldn’t come get it. The combination of potential guilt and getting to go to DP found me driving out there last night. Of course, I called Cowboy and told him I was coming, and once I dropped the meat off to Mrs. Wild Man, I went out to the barn.

He and Chris and I had a real nice dinner down at the local steak house. I very carefully refrained from thinking about the condition of the bathrooms the last time I’d been there, which had made me boycott the place for several years. I just wanted to hang with my family. We spent a lot of time catching up; Chris is on the PRCA rodeo trail travelling with another more experienced calf roper. I slipped him some money and told him that I’d sponsor him when I could. I guess there’s a whole procedure to be an official sponsor, which he’s going to look into so I can add my business name to his shirts and write it off as advertising.

I wanted to see the progress on the house, so after dinner, Cowboy took me in the back way to show me the skeleton of the future horse barn, the arenas, and the new baby. He’s built a great arena, with a narrow calf roping run on one side, the return alley down the middle, and a great big roping arena on the other side, just like he’d envisioned. It looks so much bigger than it did when it was bare dirt, but I could always picture it just as well as he could; I guess it sort of became my dream too. It’s beautiful, even in the dark and half done.

I realized sometime last night before I even saw him that while the blowtorch level of fire may have gone out, I still keep a pilot light lit for that man, and may for the rest of my life. He’s not romantic in the least, he’s not terribly communicative, and he’s rarely overtly affectionate, but he remains the one man in the world who can have my entire heart with just a word. I do sort of wonder if what we’ve got going on now is an extremely slow-motion dating situation, but I try not to overanalyze and just enjoy the ride. Should lightning happen to strike from another direction, I may or may not go with it, but I’ve sure been lucky to have had it strike once in my life.