The day Bambi shot back

It's deer season.

I’m conflicted about that. I have no quarrel with anyone who wants to get up before breakfast and go tromping in the woods when it makes much more sense to stay inside where it’s warm. That’s what you like to do, go for it.

And I try to understand that some people hunt deer because they enjoy eating venison and it stretches their food budget. I prefer my meat cut up and packaged at the grocery store.

I am not a vegetarian; I do eat meat and I know that cows, chickens, pigs and turkeys all meet the same fate so they can end up on my plate. It’s just that those deer are so beautiful. I love to see them. Yes I’ve seen some pretty cows, and lambs are as cute as they are delicious, but there’s the fact that we raise them to be consumed. Deer are just minding their own business, living in the woods, doing their deer thing. It somehow doesn’t seem right to shoot them.

On the other hand, I’m not fond of venison. And as handsome as I think elk are, I really like the taste of elk and don’t feel as sorry for them.

Like I said, it’s confusing.

I’ve heard the argument that deer destroy gardens. So do some vandalizing children, but we don’t shoot them.

I’ve also heard the theory that if we don’t thin out the deer population they’ll get sick and will all starve to death. I used that theory once on a cat-hating bird-loving acquaintance. If we don’t let the cats catch the occasional bird, then all the birds will starve to death and then where would we be? It flew over his head like a cat was after it.

It’s a puzzling situation. But there’s one aspect of the whole thing that gives me a little comfort. I recall writing once about a deer who shot back at the hunter. I’m a sucker for poetic justice.

As I remember it, a deer hunter did not set out that morning specifically to get a deer, but was out early for another reason and found he had a little extra time, his license was with him and so was his gun. So he decided to seize the moment. He saw a deer, aimed and shot.

For some reason he was in his car, not his pickup truck, so he tossed the gun in the trunk, picked up the deer by his feet and tossed it in after the gun.

But the deer wasn’t dead. After being thrown into the trunk, it revived, began kicking, and kicked the gun, which discharged and hit the hunter in the thigh.

Somehow knowing that just adds a little fairness to the whole notion of deer hunting.