Dale Valade

Like no doubt many of you, when the thermometer drops into single digits, my inner hibernating bear begins to have more than the usual sway upon my ambition. Putting a brody knob on my snow shovel helped some but still doesn’t beat sitting in my easy chair next to the woodstove not shoveling at all.

Extreme weather of every kind becomes increasingly annoying with each passing year. Ah, yes, the years. Where did the last one go? Milestones seem to come and pass much quicker and with less pomp and circumstance than they did half a lifetime ago.

As I recline back with a good book that I must’ve read 20 times or more already, I’m taken vicariously in my mind’s eye to hunt the mule deer of Sonora, Mexico, or to hunt kudu in the African bush. Often it is Jack O’Connor or Townsend Whelen, Grancel Fitz, Ernest Hemingway or Gary Cooper that accompanies me.

Not to be thwarted by the should-be reverent image of his hardworking dad asleep by the fire, my son and his dog Duke usually stampede through the living room about the time I’ve drawn a dreamy bead on some imaginary game animal.

As these two outlaws raid through the living room, sparing neither myself nor my pregnant wife from their raucous pillage, my eyes snap open. Giggles and smiles aside, I must remind Andy that my scalp is not as full as it used to be and might look lopsided hanging from the wall of his hideout. Quickly as they came, those two are off again to another part of the house, making as much noise as possible.

“Oh, good, you’re awake,” Emma says as she smiles and reminds me of how I promised to help her clean the house. Rubbing my eyes, I look outside, just to make sure I hadn’t slept through winter. Not a chance.

Cleaning, you say? Why, I know just where I can get started. Grabbing a rifle in each hand and scooting my gun cleaning kit along the floor with a foot, I once again descend upon my bear-like den near the fireplace. Opening the bottle of Hoppe’s No. 9 gun cleaning solvent, I take a huge whiff and smile at the feelings it evokes. Alcohol may destroy braincells, but Hoppe’s No. 9 restores them.

Although I am not fighting thornbush or chaparral with one of the aforementioned heroes, I am scrubbing the bore and oiling the walnut of my own legends in the making. I relive the hunts we have shared, the shots made and the hundreds of miles we have covered together.

Time gets away from us. Make the most of it. Cabin fever awaits in every nook and cranny of your house this time of year. It’s important to find useful ways of passing the time. Like winter itself, this too shall pass.

In closing, you may want to figure out how to operate the dishwasher and laundry machines. If you want to remain happily married, you’ll make time to help your wife keep up on more than just the gun cleaning. She might not think you’re as funny as my wife thinks I am.

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