WHY I USED TO HUNT

BY MICHAEL M. D'AURIA

I hunted because I'm convinced, as many anthropologists argue, that prehistoric man was a hunter before he was a farmer, and because the genetic drive remains too powerful for me to resist.  I did not need to hunt to eat, but, I did not hunt anything I did not eat.

I hunted because the ghosts of beloved companions such as Charlie and Doc and Ed and the other Charlie prance through the woods.

I hunted because the goldenrod and milkweed glisten when the early-morning November sun melts the frost from the fields, and because native brook trout spawn in hidden autumn streams, and because upstate New York glows crimson and orange and gold in the season of hunting and the snow covered fields and mountains--what could be more beautiful?

I hunted because if I didn't, I would have seen fewer eagles and ospreys, minks and beavers, foxes and bears, deer and squirrels. Although I did not happen to hunt all of these creatures, I did love to enter into their world and spy on them.

I hunted for the whistle of a woodcock's wings and the sudden explosion of a ruffed grouse's flush, for the tinkle of a cows bell and for the sudden silence.  I hunted for the distant drumming of the grouse, for the high predatory cry of a redtail hawk, for the quiet gurgle of a deep-woods trout stream, for the sibilant sighing of the breeze in the pines, for the snoring of my companion in a one-room cabin, and for the soothing patter of a fall rainstorm on a roof.

I hunted because it is never boring or disappointing to be out-of-doors with a purpose, even when no game is spotted, and because taking a walk in the woods without a purpose makes everything that happens feel random and accidental and unearned.

I hunted for the satisfying exhaustion after a long day in the woods and for the new stories that every day of hunting gave to me among good friends.

I hunted because it reminded me that in nature there is a food chain where everything eats and is, in its turn, eaten; where birth, survival, and reproduction give full meaning to life, where death is ever present, and where the only uncertainty is the time and manner of that death.  Hunting reminded me that I am integrated into that cycle, not separate from or above it.

I hunted because it kept my passions alive and my memories fresh. My senses alert, even as my hair grows gray, and, because I was afraid that if I stopped hunting, I would instantly become an old man. I hunted because I believed that as long as I hunted I would remain young.

I no longer hunt...