Hardships are quickly forgotten. Intense heat, bitter cold, rain and snow, fatigue,and luckless hunting fade quickly into memories of great fellowship, thoughts of beautiful country, pleasant camps, and happy campfires.

I feel like one of God's chosen people, having had the opportunity to share, with many fine companions, these varied and lovely realms of our natural world.

When bow-hunting, you find you get closer to the woodland critters. The flora and the forest floor becomes clearer. You look at things more closely. You're moreaware. You know the limited range of the bow is only 40 yards or so. You must try to outwait that approaching deer. Careful not to make the slightest movement or sound hoping that your scent won't suddenly waft his way. That's when you'll know for sure and appreciate deeply what bow-hunting is all about.

Life in the open is one of my finest rewards. I enjoy and become completely immersed in the high challenge and increased opportunity to become for a time, a part of nature. Deer hunting is a classical exercise in freedom. It is a return to fundamentals that I instinctively feel are basic and right.

If some of our teenage thrill seekers really want to go out and get a thrill, let them go up into the Northwest and tangle with the Grizzly Bear, the Polar Bear, and the Brown Bear. They will get their kicks, and it will cleanse their souls.

I have always tempered my killing with respect for the game pursued. I see the animal not only as a target, but as a living creature with more freedom than I will ever have. I take that life if I can, with regret as well as joy, and with the sure knowledge that nature's way of fang and claw and starvation are a far crueler fate than I bestow.

If you are not working to protect hunting, then you are working to destroy it.