Hunting, by Ricky

I am always hunting. Usually it is for my next meal. Often, it is for ice cream. Sometimes, it is for a cheap gas station. Occasionally, I’ll hunt for a traveling companion. Once I hunted squirrels, but gave it up after the time I shot a squirrel high in a tree. The squirrel fell down landing “spread eagle” practically at my feet followed two seconds later by the branch he had been sitting on. Whereupon, the squirrel jumped up, looked at me with those big squirrel eyes as if to say, “How could you?”, and ran away. I decided I wasn’t much of a mighty squirrel hunter, if all I could bag was the branch he was sitting on.

I gave up all animal hunting for good on the night some friends and I were “spot lighting” jack rabbits in the Nevada desert. I had shot one but not a clean kill and it lay on the ground squealing. I tried to put it out of its misery from a short distance away but kept missing. I finally had to walk up to it, look into its eyes while I pulled the trigger. My heart broke and I gave up the thrill of killing animals. Spiders and snakes are another matter.

I even have an on-again-off-again passion to hunt for my ancestors to keep my genealogy moving backwards. I frequently have to hunt for a public or private place where I can be naked soaking in hot water alone or with a friend. The soaking is not always required as I often just contemplate nature’s eye candy.

My absolute favorite hunting activity is to locate a really good pun or good clean jokes like: 

Why do sharks swim in salt-water? Because they sneeze too much in pepper water. 

What did the chicken write in her diary? “Dear Diary, today I crossed the road, yet I have no idea why.”

Don’t you wish we lived in a society where a chicken can cross the road and no one questions her motives?

© 26 September 2016

About the Author

I was born in June of 1948 in Los Angeles, living first in Lawndale and then in Redondo Beach. Just prior to turning 8 years old in 1956, I began living with my grandparents on their farm in Isanti County, Minnesota for two years during which time my parents divorced.

When united with my mother and stepfather two years later in 1958, I lived first at Emerald Bay and then at South Lake Tahoe, California, graduating from South Tahoe High School in 1966. After three tours of duty with the Air Force, I moved to Denver, Colorado where I lived with my wife and four children until her passing away from complications of breast cancer four days after the 9-11 terrorist attack.

I came out as a gay man in the summer of 2010. I find writing these memories to be therapeutic.

My story blog is TheTahoeBoy.Blogspot.com