MESSIN’ UP – Vol. I (2006) No. 6
“The Best Laid Plans”
By Mike Faulk

October 21, 2006

While the weather was a simply perfect for the third weekend of October, the hunting had been anything but perfect. As one might expect after a cloudless night with temperatures dipping into the mid-thirties, the river was shrouded in fog until late morning. There was no wind to move the fog about. The leaves were moist with morning dew so anything trying to move quietly through the woods could.

My morning hunting venue was the duck blind in the mouth of the sluice. From this perch three years before I observed - for only seconds - the biggest deer I had ever seen in the field. The rack was at least 12 points and the body was in the two hundred fifty pound range. It was a foggy morning such as this – but later in the fall. Could history repeat itself and give me a second chance at immortality? Of course not! I didn’t see a thing all morning.

Lunch at the cabin consisted of Shirley’s very fine homemade chili with Panola Pepper Company sauce. Having my doubts about the prospects for a successful afternoon, a rocking spell on the front porch seemed in order after the meal.

Having never rocked one rock, my attention was peaked by movement in my right peripheral vision. Sure enough, a doe was working her way toward me through the food plot of shade blend clovers situated just to the north of the cabin. Getting up or reaching for the bow was out of the question.

She reached the southern edge of the plot and turned north toward the river but behind the corded firewood. I grabbed the bow and eased to a position were I’d be able to get a shot when she crossed the six-foot wide trail between the cabin and the river. At least, that was my plan.

As she stopped just before crossing the trail, I drew the bow. The path she was on was almost exactly thirty yards from my place of concealment at the edge of the thicket surrounding the cabin. Centering the 30-yard pin in the trail, I waited. She did, too. The deer then made a ninety degree turn and traveled with the trail toward the river remaining protected by the box elders and wild vines that form a canopy.

Darting across the trail some eight to nine yards further away than expected, the deer presented herself for a shot for only an instant. I had to move the sights and release the arrow in the same motion to have any chance. It turns out I didn’t. The arrow passed low and just under her mid-section.

Note to self: Wasn’t it Steinbeck who said, “The best laid plans of mice and men go awry.”