Owls: friend or foe?
It was one of those mornings so pristine it brought on cliché revelations of how I should better my life. Broadcasting ruins every personal moment. The white frost was still thick; the sun hadn’t made its way over the mountains yet. I thought about thinking, and how I should do more of it. I thought about what I was doing out in the woods. I was out for the life of another living being. Didn’t faze me, I put the gun in my own hands. As I slowly made my way down the side of the mountain toward a ravine, my two hunting partners were up on the ridge attempting a push, to move deer from the top down to me. Hunting is nothing, more than it is anything. Meaning you spend more time sitting in the middle of the woods on your ass then heroically slaying a deer and talking about it over beers. I enjoy sitting in the cold weather watching the sun come up, if I go home with a deer, even better. This morning was pristine for a reason. It was setting the stage for the most up-close and personal time with a Barred Owl I have ever had. I was later informed that this was no blessing, but an omen of death.
“God damn it. Why did you tell me that now,” I said to Jenny, “The pork, the weather and everything, I was happy. I was inspired and you pretty much shit on that.”
“All I’m saying is that it is something I heard. Encounters with owls are omens of death.”
“Screw it. I’ll just bank on the whole 2012 thing to go down before the owls attack.”
“Really, this girl wrote a whole thesis about attributing owls to some kind of premortem notification of a death.”
What a way to end a great day. I’m not personally afraid of death. I like life, but wouldn’t be heart broken with out it. I caught the owl out of the corner of my eye as I sat silent under the hickory trees. I couldn’t stop staring at him. Owls really are majestic and wise. They give off a similar air to that of the silent intellectual; you know something is going on upstairs, but you don’t know what. I spent about an hour in his company, and in that time, I made my way to about ten feet in front of him. He didn’t seem to pay me the slightest of thought even with my camera out. It was the kind of look that makes you feel like you couldn’t hide anything, similar to the look my mother would give me when I came home stoned in high school. I had my time, and when I felt I had stared enough I thanked him and was on my way. Did he know about the horrible people who slay gorgeous animals for fun? Did he know about all the dumb asses that would shoot him out of the tree, and choke on their chewing tobacco laughing about it? I was in the woods for a reason that many people disagree with. I was out to take a life, but ended up being able to show my respect and admiration for another.
Hunting is complex and demanding; it is man playing death. We go out and we decide that it is time for something to end its life. Whether the Native American perspective was correct in the sense that an animal only presents itself when its time has come, or we make that decision for them, they still have no more of an idea when their death will come than we do. What ever omen this owl brought to me was not that of death. If anything I gained a perspective of death, and I didn’t even know it was coming.
Short URL: http://www.themountaineer.org/?p=1102
Posted by GMC Voices
on Dec 9, 2009 Filed under First-Person.
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