I don’t know whose idea it was to have kids go back to school in the fall, but it had to have been some kind of sadistic person. Fall should be when we go back to hunting, not school. I know when I was a kid, I’d have gladly traded the summer as a time out of school for the fall. I’d have much rather had my days free through the big game, waterfowl and upland bird seasons.
It’s just cruel and unusual punishment, if you ask me. Especially on the days when I’m going pheasant hunting. For the past 15 years, Logan and Colby had to watch me get all my gear loaded into the truck as they gathered their school bags and lunch boxes, and they’d go to the end of the driveway to wait for the bus while I cruised out in search of long-tailed goony birds.
This is the last year of high school for my youngest, and my oldest is now in college. Logan’s still out of luck for hunting most of the time, but Colby planned his schedule at UW so that he can spend the weekend at home and go hunting, and even stretch it to Monday and at least get in a morning hunt from time to time. He’ll still have to miss a class if he does a Monday hunt, but he should be OK if he only does it every once in a while.
Multi-day big game hunts are a different story. We might need to wait until both the boys are gainfully employed before we can sneak out for a week-long elk hunt again. Neither of them can miss that much school.
It would be so much better if kids went to school through the winter, spring and summer, then got fall for their long break. I’ve voiced my opinion on that subject since I was a kid in school, but nobody ever listened.
Sorry, kids, I tried.
