Now THAT is hunting

This blog is supposed to be very selfishly all about the life of me. I don’t care if anyone ever reads it or not. It is really more of a diary. But, the events of this evening were so remarkable that they must be recorded somewhere. This seems as good a place as any.

Remember the old line from Karate Kid? “The man who can catch a fly with chopsticks can do anything.” I have a corollary to that statement:

The boy who can kill a rabbit with a baseball can also probably do anything.

Josiah was out at baseball practice and Kay was out with a friend this evening while Wyatt and I were here in the house. He was playing Nintendo, and I was figuring out if there is any way to download the old arcade game “Joust” to run on our PC. Bursting into this quiet and calm was the third born, the lightning bolt, the blonde maverick of the family announcing excitedly that “we” had finally got a bunny! Wyatt went running outside to see what was going on, and I stayed at my post. I assumed that Cade must have caught a baby bunny, which is not too uncommon an event in the Springtime around this house.

A couple minutes later Cade and Wyatt came running back into the house and explained that Cade had “got” the bunny with a baseball.

“You got a rabbit with a baseball?” I asked.

“Yes!”

“You killed a rabbit with a baseball?” I asked.

“Yeah, Dad! Come out and see. I got as close as I thought I could and then my instinct told me that I better not get any closer or he would run away, so I just threw the ball at him.”

“I have to see this.” I replied, finding my own pulse quickening, somewhat excited by the exceedingly unlikely event that had apparently transpired. I went out with Cade to look. Wyatt told us he didn’t want to look at the poor bunny any more. It kinda bummed him out. I understand that and respect that he felt that way. I used to feel that way sometimes when I was a kid out hunting and I killed a pheasant or a quail – particularly when I had to break its neck to finish it off. I got over that over the years for the most part, but Wyatt has not been around hunting nearly as much as I had been by his age. That’s OK. Cade did not seem fazed at all, however.

So, outside I went, marching across Mr. Paul’s yard in my socks, getting them wet because the ground was still wet from the snowstorm last weekend and the heavy frost this morning. On the far side of the neighbor’s driveway, there it was, sure as shootin’, an adult rabbit lying there and looking quite, uh, asleep.

“It’s dead, Dad. Wyatt and I poked it and stuff, and it didn’t move at all.”

I moved it a little with my foot. Indeed. Dead as a post.

“Wow, Cade, that is amazing. How did you get him again with the baseball?”

He explained that he had chased a couple of bunnies a couple of times around the yard when one stopped but another one ran on away. He accused the other rabbit of “chickening out.” [All things considered, can’t say I blame it!] Anyway, he said when he first started chasing the rabbits around the yards he had acquired a couple of baseballs from the trunk of my car so he would be ready, just in case. And sure enough….

“Dad, I got as close to him as I could and my instinct told me that if I got any closer he would run away so I threw the baseball at him. When I hit him it kinda flipped him over, and then he sorta laid there for a little bit and kinda moved his legs a little bit but that was it.”

It was getting close to time to load up Wyatt and Cade to go pick up Josiah at baseball practice. I offered to clean the rabbit so we could eat him, an offer that Cade first turned down but then upon further reflection enthusiastically accepted. We were out of time for the moment because we had to go get Josiah, so Cade put the bunny in the back yard fort while we went to get Josiah. I figured there it had a good chance of avoiding detection by the neighborhood cats – including our cat – and maybe we could get back to cleaning it upon our return.

When we got home Cade let me know that he still really wanted me to clean that rabbit so we could eat him. I got my small hunting knife and met the boy on the driveway with the bunny. As we were preparing for our work, however, Cade got another little ego booster – like he needed one – that postponed us for a few more minutes.

As Maverick’s little luck would have it one of the neighborhood moms was driving by with a couple of his classmates, James and Brandon. As they were going by, they saw Cade holding the rabbit by the hind feet and they begged James’ mom to stop. “What is that Cade is holding?!?”, they asked her. “Can we stop and see?!?” They begged her. She stopped so they could see.

James and Brandon stood in eight-year-old awe of the dead rabbit in Cade’s right hand. They listened in rapt attention to the Cade’s re-telling of the story of how he had done it in. Meanwhile, I made my way to the mom in the SUV and began to explain the subject cautiously.

“I don’t know how you feel about hunting and such things,” I started.

“Oh, please!” She immediately interrupted. “I have boys!”

I explained that Cade had killed that rabbit with a baseball and that I had never seen anything like it. I have to say that I admire that woman. She really did seem to understand the nature of boys. She congratulated Cade on his hunting prowess, gave the two boys in her charge a couple more minutes to stand in awe, summoned them back into the SUV and drove away. But I am afraid that as the story spreads through the elementary school there may be boys carrying baseballs throughout the neighborhood for weeks now, hoping to duplicate the feat of my little blonde Maverick.

After Cade’s admirers saddled up and drove away we got down to the business at hand. The light was starting to fade by now and we needed to get that carcass taken care of. I give Cade credit. He hung in there and helped me with the whole process of skinning, gutting and cleaning, and he didn’t complain at all. I was pleased he had the opportunity to exercise good hunting ethics; we will make good use of that rabbit and will not wantonly waste it. It was a good lesson for him, and I felt blessed to be a part of it with him.

Of course, from my point of view there had to be some bragging. Maybe he shouldn’t brag, but I didn’t see any reason why I couldn’t brag a little. I made calls to Dad and my brother, Tim, informing them that for all of their hunting accomplishments they had been overshadowed in one stroke by an eight-year-old little boy. I know how many rocks and balls I have thrown at squirrels and rabbits over the years, mostly without ever getting even close, and I was 100% confident that nobody else in my family had ever taken game with a baseball or any other hand thrown projectile. Clearly, Cade had outdone several generations of Heikes hunters in one stroke with his mighty right arm! You go boy. You are one of a kind, and your Dad loves you for everything you are and everything you are gifted with.

I guess we shall find out shortly how suburban rabbit tastes!

By the way, for the random visitor that might happen to stumble upon this obscure corner of the internet, every word of the above story is absolutely true.