A good bear race can often run for miles and miles. If you’re lucky, it stays up in accessible country. If you’re not, down into the canyons they go, and you spend hours getting the dogs back, if not a night or two camped out where you turned in, honking and waiting for them. Junior and Todd had to hike into the Emigrant Wilderness Area last year to retrieve three; they thought one might be dead from the way the locator collar was acting, but he was fine.

But every once in a while, you catch a sprinter who shoots up a tree immediately. When something like that happens and you hadn’t seen a track, it makes you think it might be something else. Bobcats and foxes don’t run nearly as far as bears tend to, so the races are a lot faster.

On Saturday morning we got after a track near one of the canyons. The dogs thought it was a hot one, but we couldn’t find a footprint. Todd turned some out anyway and away they went, fortunately up the hill in the better direction. Since Junior and I were at the back of the convoy, we turned around to go to the saddle to listen, which was maybe a quarter mile down from where they started. We passed them on the way.

They were so close to the road that the echoes made it sound like they might have crossed the road in front of us, but the second time we stopped, it was obvious that they hadn’t, that they were still uphill and really close. Even though it was very early, they sure sounded to me like they were treed. Dean pulled up and he thought so too, enough that he had the shooter headed up the hill before everyone got to the trucks.

I’ve been missing a lot of trees lately, and this one was close, so I took off after them, leaving Junior to deal with the kids. For once, I got there in plenty of time to take a lot of pictures. Everyone got there, kids and all. After pulling the dogs off and making sure the kids were in a safe spot, the shooter lined it out. I was behind him, which is a good vantage point for photography, but we were both right downhill of the tree. Not the best place to be if the bear comes down wounded, as they usually go downhill.

I made sure that the bear had an obvious opening without people just to my left. There was just one guy there; all of the rest were to my right, with the dogs. Bears will usually run from a trapped feeling. I was pushing it being on the edge of the funnel.

So of course, this bear wasn’t dead when it hit the ground, and of course, I had the camera out and not the pistol. Dean was in front of me as the backup shooter, and he got two shots off into it; it dropped for good about six feet to the left of where I’d been standing. The one guy that had been on my left got moving so quickly that he yanked me down with him, so it was a very good thing Dean hit that bear well; I would have been the closest one to it if Dean hadn’t put himself between us. That bear was dying though; I don’t think I was in a ton of danger. The adrenaline rush had me shaking for a while though.

The shooter had the biggest grin I’ve seen yet. I think that guy is seriously hooked, and I think his dad was pleased with the hunt too. They were very nice people, and it was good to be in on a successful hunt for them.

I’ve dabbled in lots of things in my life, with varying degrees of immersion. Some things you just scratch the surface on and some things become a part of who you are.

Quilting was like that for me for a few years about a decade ago. I threw myself into it. I lived and breathed fabric. I designed quilts in my head – some were completed, some only started, and some never saw a stitch. I’ll have to find some pictures, but the few unfinished objects I still have around, I still remember exactly what my vision each one was. If I choose, I could go find the raw materials (the challenging part after a move) and get right back to it. I choose not to mostly because quilting was something I did at the most unhappy point of my life, and touching it reminds me of those days. As much as I loved it, and as much as it helped my sanity at the time, I don’t want to go back there again right now.

Roping had the potential to become everything to me. I eased into it slowly, learning better horsemanship before I ever started to swing a rope from the ground. I really enjoyed it and let it define me to the point of inspiring the name for this journal, which has long since become slightly irrelevant. Long-time readers know why and how I was suddenly thrust out of that world. Losing the hobby was as much or more of a blow as losing the relationship that spawned it. It’s certainly had longer-lasting repercussions for me. I miss the horses and the cattle and the sport, but obviously not the man.

Of course, there are things that are strictly entertaining but not defining. I like the photography a lot, but I don’t claim to be a photographer. I haven’t taken class one to enrich that branch. I enjoy doing it because it’s fun, is all. I like to mess around in my garden and eat my tomatoes, but I’m no expert. I’m good at training dogs but have no inclination to make an agility competitor out of one of them.

Cooking falls somewhere between the two extremes. Of course, I have to do it, a lot, and I get to resenting it for that. Sometimes though, it’s just plain fun. I like to make my jams and smoke my sausages and trout, and cooking for a party is really satisfying. I’m good at it, but it’s not one of my top passions.

No, that spot has been reserved for hunting for the last decade. I wanted it so badly that I drug an inexperienced ex-husband into the sport when I was 23. I resented like crazy the gap of years when life kept me from hunting, even though I’d never killed a thing. I had the drive years ago; something slightly unusual, I gather, for someone who didn’t grow up in the sport.

I met some enablers right around the time I got divorced. A good group of guys who didn’t mind an apprentice tagging along. They got me started on a path that I’ll be following for the rest of my life. One hunting buddy and one way of hunting led to another, which led to another, which led to a consuming passion. I live for hunting season. I think about it all year. I already hunt for at least three months a year and would like more. It exhausts me, but I’m willing to make that choice. I’m extremely fortunate to have found someone who shares that passion.

The bear hunting in particular is a black hole. I got exposed to the adrenaline and it’s done nothing but suck me in further each year. I went from running with them one time to talking my connection into doing it a few times the next year. After that I just dove in. I was drawn in more each year until bear hunting was what I did, with a little deer hunting in the afternoons.

Grey Fox has said for years that I’d make a good houndsman. Well, maybe so, but it seemed like a bit much to do by myself. There’s a lot to it in the off-season, and I just didn’t have the resources. I was sort of waiting until Seamus was old enough to drive and become my partner in crime, but then I met Junior.

Having a partner whose passion is also yours is a mixed blessing. It’s fanstastic to be able to share your activities with someone else who also gets the draw and it’s great to be able to spend so much time together, but it can be a little hard on the checkbook. Where I would have waited a few years and so would he, suddenly we’re a team with complementary skills. I’m not great at getting to the dogs in a deep canyon or pulling the bears out, but he is. He doesn’t much care for taking care of dogs at home, but I’m good at that. We egg each other on higher than either of us might have gone alone.

We’ve been talking about it, and somehow it’s gone from maybe getting a hound next year to thinking about buying a dog rig that’s for sale. I thought we’d just continue outfitting the Dodge, but it is a little big and cumbersome to get everywhere it needs to. We’re fortunate to have these mentors to work with right now too, and don’t want to blow that chance. And I’m getting a little old to be starting a physical sport; if I want to get a good ten years’ worth out of this, I’d best start pretty soon. I’d hate to miss this and have it be on my list of regrets. I should have jumped into the roping more when I had the chance, and I don’t want to make the same mistake with the hounds. Besides, it’s not like it’s an irrevocable decision; hounds and boxes and trucks are all marketable commodities if we decide we hate it. We can get out of it as easily as we can get into it if it doesn’t work for us.

So don’t be too surprised in the next year to see a Walker Hound or two of our own pop up here, or a tracking box, or another vehicle. It’s not a done deal yet, but we’re sliding towards another degree of passion, one that will consume us for much of the year. I predict a lot more poison oak in my future, some kennels out back, and a whole lot more dog poo. But with that comes a whole hell of a lot of fun. It will be an adrenaline-fueled ride, that’s for sure.

It’s been a hard year of hunting so far. It’s been unseasonably warm, except for one snow storm that only stuck around for a day. There are hardly any deer in the area – our camp usually has two or three bucks hanging by the second weekend, and this year it took until three and a half weeks in before the first one was killed.

And the bear feed is non-existant this year. Usually one source of feed produces well. One year it was acorns, last year it was choke cherries. There’s usually something to draw them in and hold them in the area while they stuff their faces to fatten up for winter. This year though, it’s lean. There are hardly any cherries or acorns, and even the manzanita berries are thin. There aren’t as many deer gut piles for the bears to supplement their diets with. The few bears we’ve killed haven’t had any significant fat at all.

They’re still here, the bears, but they’re not staying put. We catch them travelling through looking for more feed, and we’re catching far fewer than in years past. This weekend was the first one I remember that we got absolutely skunked on. We didn’t even tree a sow and cubs to let go, like we did last weekend. No, this one was spent entirely looking for tracks, putting dogs out on marginal strikes, and then spending hours rounding up dogs.

We did have one bit of adventure. Senior had taken the three kids up to our camp while we bullshitted down at bear camp. On his way up, he came across some hunters that had run their Toyota off the road. Nothing they had could pull it out, his hooptie sure wouldn’t do it, and they were having a language problem with AAA.

So he called us on the radio to come lend a hand in the big Dodge. Now, if it were snowing or on a dirt road, we’d have thought twice about it, not being willing to risk having our truck go off the edge too, like happened to my friend Jeff a few years back in a storm. He’s still known as the guy who was hanging off the side of the mountain. Everyone who hunts up there has heard of him, and it’s not a flattering story.

But it was on dry pavement, and I carry a nice assortment of tow straps and chains, so Junior and Senior hooked one around the guy’s frame and chained it to my hitch. A few minutes later and he was out up on the road again, and very grateful. We didn’t even do any more damage to his truck getting it out; a different pull-point would have had the nose end swinging down into the trees. His front panel was wedged into his tire, so again we hooked a chain to it and gave it a little pressure with the Dodge, and it popped right out. He had only damaged his windshield washer reservoir, so he was even free to roll again.

The ladies with them were so grateful. It was very cute. They didn’t speak much English but were trying to push money at us. We didn’t accept; sometime it might be us needing help. It was nice for the help to be appreciated though, and it was also nice to have something to take photos of for the weekend at least.

There’s a storm rolling in tonight that should have both the deer and the bear milling around nicely. Junior’s going up Wednesday night and I wish I could too. But I’ve got a new hire working backup for me starting this weekend and I don’t get to leave early any more. But hey, at least I get to go. I’ll take two days over nothing any time.