Tyler handed out another round of beers — I’m using the term lightly as Keystone Ice has never been in the conversation for best beer.
“Fellas, I think this is my last one. 3:30 is going to come real early.”
I opened mine and leaned back into the hotel room’s only office chair, settling into the flattened cushion. Caleb sat on the stiff bed to my left, prepping the Texas rigs on our decoys in the unstable light of the one corner lamp in the room. We finished our beers, and I went back to my room, anxious to wake up for my first duck hunt.
Tyler was right. That alarm came early. I only needed to get up once to rid my body of the excess beer from the night before. I turned on the bathroom light and closed my right eye to see if the blind spot in my left eye was still there — a tradition I had taken up ever since the small spot appeared in my vision back in July. It hadn’t gone anywhere miraculously overnight; the Keystone was not a magic elixir. The guys didn’t know about this development or the potential causes, or that I was waiting on the results of an MRI.
They also didn’t know that earlier in November, the cigarettes and complications of COPD had finally caught up with my father, landing him in the ICU after a series of small strokes. His body was failing him, and he was on borrowed time. Every phone call I received during that time an electric jolt of anxiety through my body. Was it the results of my MRI? Had my father finally passed away?
The draw house was filled with the buzz of duck hunters, waiting to see which pill was drawn. Each group talked about their early season so far without giving up too many details of which blinds were producing birds. We drew the number one pill in the early registration period, so we picked our blind and were on our way.
I trudged through the muddy lake bottom, hoping my waders were tall enough to keep water out. I listened intently as the other guys — experienced duck hunters — spread out the decoys, debating if a Mojo spinner would bring more ducks in or deter them. It made its way into the spread.
“Single. To our right.” Caleb called out an incoming duck right at the legal shooting light. “Casey, get ready.”
Within 5 minutes of shooting light, I had gone from never holding a duck to holding a green-winged teal, its wing changing to purple as I turned it over in my hand. I found the flank feathers that I’d eventually use to tie streamer flies. A harvest of food and fly-tying materials, no part going to waste.
As I set the bird down and climbed back into the blind, I realized the death of that bird had finally been a distraction to the pending death of my father and the fear of my own health issues. We gathered the 18 ducks that we shot that day. We had the opportunity for many more, but I blame my inexperience. I’m not sure what the others’ excuses were.
***
My grandma’s house always smelled of bacon in the mornings, and the sizzling always brought me from a deep sleep and out to the dining area. When she passed away in 2013, my father took over her house, and the tradition remained: bacon, eggs, biscuits with jelly and coffee.
However, that morning it didn’t. Only the sound of the TV left on all night as my mom slept in the living room recliner, and the smell of stale cigarette smoke left over from a decade of my father’s lung abuse greeted me. He knew that the cigarettes were killing him. The doctors told him as much five years earlier, when he was first diagnosed with COPD and cirrhosis of the liver from excess drinking. He gave up drinking but was never able to give up cigarettes.
The oxygen tank in the corner was silent for the first time since the diagnosis, as there was no longer a body relying on it. I thought having years to mentally prepare myself for my father’s passing would make it easier to handle, but it seemed how it happened was unfair.
I left the quiet house and yellowed wallpaper behind to buy my first decoys. I bought a cheap set from Cabela’s using some extra cash my dad had lying around that my mom told me to take. He’d want me to have it. The box of decoys and my first calls stayed in my truck until I arrived home after the funeral that week.
The decoys made their debut in January. Austin and I crashed ice in the dark, the muddy lake bottom vacuuming my boots. Austin was there the day before and saw tons of birds, assuring me a limit of birds was in my future.
“Casey, get your shotgun. A duck just landed in the decoys.” I thought it was a joke. We were standing out in the middle of the river after first light revealed a fresh sheet of ice had carried our spread 30 yards downriver. Sure enough, there in the middle of our spread sat a lone coot who very politely waited for me to get my shotgun.
That was it – one coot. I texted my friends, who were not impressed:
Just a dirty diver. – Justin
I wouldn’t have wasted a shell on that. – Tristan
***
My 5-year-old, Brooks, rubbed the sleep from his eyes and smiled wide, excited to sit with me for a duck hunt. I grabbed him a cup of hot chocolate and we went to our property on the river, trying to find some ducks that were passing over the frozen farm ponds.
“Dad, where are the ducks? We’ve been out here for, like, 15 minutes. I don’t think they live here.” He wasn’t wrong. We stayed until 9:30, waiting as I fielded questions about why they weren’t there. Where was his tablet? What animals eat ducks? Are there bears? Should we be scared? Did we bring any more donuts?
“Did you have fun, Brooks?” I asked, hopeful.
“Not really. It was cold, and there were no ducks. Just like I said.”
I couldn’t fault the honesty. I also couldn’t hide my happiness with having him there with me, even though there were no ducks. It was his first hunting trip. Something I was never able to do with my dad. He wasn’t a hunter, and that was okay.
I was creating my own legacy and traditions with my family. The ones I wished that I had growing up. I was jealous of the friends who came to school on Mondays in mid-November, telling stories of hunting with their dad or grandpa, or both, if they were lucky — the dream childhood of the Midwestern boy.
The next night, as I got Brooks ready for bed, he looked up at me. “Dad, at school, when they ask us what the best part of my weekend was, I’m going to say duck hunting with you.” I couldn’t resist a smile. “Even though there were no ducks.”
***
Nobody knew, I don’t think even I did, how badly I needed the distraction of the hunt. The cold, the ducks, learning to call, setting decoys, talking with friends – it was all I had to take my mind off the passing of my father and my health.
My MRI showed nothing out of the ordinary. I was left with more questions than answers, and Google was not my friend during those times.
I was able to tell my dad about my first duck hunt with my friends before he passed, and he smiled ear to ear the whole time. He loved cooking, so I shared some recipes I prepared with the duck, one of the few meats he’d never cooked with. He was looking forward to trying it sometime, though we both knew it was unlikely.
Now, duck season corresponds directly with thoughts of my father, though we never hunted together. Every meal I prepare with it is a meal dedicated to him, hoping he’s able to try some, wherever it is he landed.
