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WITH MUPP AND SAVAGE (and Paradise Pond 8)

THIS WEEK'S UD FEATURE

www.upstatediary.com

MEDITATIONS ON THE ORIGIN OF THE ASCETIC OR TALE OF THE WET ASS MEAT HUNTER

 The beauty of writing a blog is you do not have to run such a title past an editor. Cheeky gives me the paw over the eye, the cat equivalent to our "thumbs up" and I go forward.

   In many ways this has been my worst season ever in the deer woods. I couldn't get the bow string back on a good buck, I passed on an 8 I had a good shot at and I killed a button buck by mistake. My self identification as a Trophy Hunter has been modified to desperate meat hunter. How the mighty have fallen. Lets spin towards Avid Locavore. The front end of a Nor-Easter is already upon us and I barely saw a deer all day. The roads were too icy to make it to Mr. X's Mystery Farm, so I holed up in back of the house. The sleet turned to rain. Luckily I found an empty hut and sat out the morning relatively dry. It was then I thought of today's blog theme.

    Firstly, I'm not hunting for wet ass meat. Rather, my ass is constantly wet as I hunt for meat. And this got me to thinking about the parallels with asceticism and the not so obvious fact that religion and art probably come directly out of hunting. Those little striations on that clam shell from 400,000 years ago were probably done while waiting for something to show up, by a guy with a wet ass. And these kinda thoughts don't enter the inner conversation until late in a very trying season. When they do, it makes the sit easier. My legs were crossed, muzzleloader in my lap.. I twisted in yoga-like moves, in order to see movement through the dripping woods. Nothing. Nothing. The ascetic prays. I fantasize a big, juicy doe. If I had a clam shell, I'd be scratching it. 

   Tomorrow we're suppose to get snow. This could be a game changer. After this storm passes I'll get back to the farm. But, in the meantime I'll play the wind, still hunt from hut to hut, and see what happens. The profundity of my thought patterns will ebb and flow, as the wet snow falls down my neck into my ass crack. I'll walk down the hill on the road in the morning and hunt the mountain back. It won't be easy and I may never see a deer, but I guarantee you, as the barb wire tightens, the hair shirt itches and I pour more pebbles into my boots, there's nowhere I would rather be. And that is my version of spirituality.                  

CHEEKY

IT'S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE FAILURE

A little over a week left in deer season and it's not looking good. Gun season ends at 4:29 pm on Sunday. Then we switch gear and pick up the muzzleloader until Dec. 16. That's it for 2014. Every day matters at this point and today I'm pretty much shut down with pouring icy rain. Of course I can get out there, in the hut or under the treebrella, but long hours in the pouring rain usually is fruitless. Deer like to move in this shit as much as we do. I've often compared deer hunting with art making, with all it's inherent frustration and eventual futility. In many ways it's worse. I can always come up with something, art wise. Try as I might I can't make a deer materialize. Then step back and look at an art "career" of 40 years, and yes, art gets the prize in the failure department. There is no end but death. And even then (ask Shewho, who handles two dead artists, will tell you) careerism is never over.
   Deer season begins on Oct. 1 and ends on Dec. 16. Because of no work this year, it has been a total immersion season. I challenge Marina Abramovich to sit in a tree 11 hours a day in 9 degree weather, 7 days a week, trying not to cough or move, in any of her so-called endurance pieces. Simultaneously the good and bad thing about this is it is limited to a season. There may be a season for art world market artists, but for me there is none. It stretches out endlessly, promising nothing. And this is where deer hunting varies. Every turn of the head, click of the second hand, crack of a twig, promises a chance at redemption. Will that wide 8 (or an even bigger one) materialize out of the nothingness. It's happened before, I constantly remind myself. And then it's over.
   To combine hunting with my art is asking for nothing but isolation in a world of anti-gun, anti-hunter mindset, that permeates the ultra-liberal world of "the arts". You think facebook is filled with PC types? Doing this type of work and expecting the art industry to embrace it is ludicrous. Why I don't accept this is another issue altogether. And once again the parallels in not accepting my defeat in the deer woods are apparent. Persistence, perseverance, bone-headed stubbornness, call it whatever you want. When the season is over, if I come up empty, I will go through my grieving, my depression, my feeling sorry for myself, and then I will get back in the studio and try to make sense of the mess of a bed I have made for myself. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Lets just say- I am one lucky man.      

WOMAN AND POCKETBOOK

TROPHY 2014

SHROUD (early phase)

KERN GIRL

CUDDLE DEATH OF THE BUTTON BUCK

I'm outta gas- figuratively and literally. I came out of the woods last night to that sickly sweet smell of poverty: my propane tanks on empty. To say it's been a rough season would be an understatement at this point. I have a constant crick in my back from long cold hours on stand and everything around the house has gone to hell. As other hunters seem to be having a banner year, the hardest hunter I know (besides myself) Savage Lynch is in the same boat. Yesterday he shot Bambi and the day before I shot his mother....at least that's what I thought.
    Since the last week of bow season I've been hunting that big 8 over at Majestic, with no luck. I haven't seen horns in a while and in this weather (fog and rain) I'm lucky to see a deer. It's not like I haven't been here before, but after last season's big bucks, it seems especially crushing. So on the weekend I decided to take a doe. Shouldn't be a problem, right? I'm sure you have a whole bunch under your bird feeder in the backyard. Well, I've seen deer and had shots, but they've all been little butterballs. A large doe seems to be as illusive as that 8. So when I saw a medium sized deer a couple of mornings ago, I was ready to pull the trigger. I took my time, watching the deer feed a 100 yard circle for about an hour. When "she" came down the pike I pulled the gun up at 50 yards. When the vitals were offered I pulled the trigger dropping the deer in "her" tracks. Then I poured myself a cup of coffee, thanked the LGM and the deer, and congratulated myself on a good shot, deciding to let the woods settle down and see if a buck would show. It was at this point I noticed something strange on the head of that deer- two little antlers. I'd killed a button buck by mistake. Damn!
   I'm usually so careful to look at the head, not wanting to shoot a spike. But these horns were so small and I was so certain it was a doe, that I didn't look when it got close. If the DEC agent assigned to my blog wants to arrest me, go ahead. I deserve it. Take me away. That's how things are going. Thankfully the gas man just showed up. I spilled a whole cup of coffee on him, just trying to be nice. I can wash my dishes, take a shower, and butcher up the little buck today. He'll eat good, and by this evening all the evidence will be gone. He didn't deserve a 30.06 in the chest. Cheeky sniffs his ear on the porch and looks at me with puzzled dismay. I know. I know. Always look at the head.