| I think the closer you are to the actual killing of animals, the more you tend to revere them, if anything. As someone who has recently joined that club, I agree. I have been hunting for years but this year I killed my first deer. The whole process changed something inside of me. Because of my actions, this gentle creature went from breathing, living and doing whatever it wanted to being food. While I was aiming my shot, she turned her head towards me and looked at me. I can clearly remember seeing her blink. I put the arrow through her heart and lungs. I dragged her out of the woods. I gutted her and hung her up. I packed her body in ice. These were things that I had seen done before but never did myself. As I was field dressing the body, I looked at her and apologized, then I thanked her for providing healthy meat to feed my family. In my mind, it changed venison from butcher paper wrapped meat that was leaner than beef into the flesh of an animal that was killed. I don't know what she thought but I think she was, on some level, self aware. |