Leaves Turn Red in Fall for a Few Reasons

This week I’m sharing two stories about my dad. He’s the person who probably influenced me the most on what it means to be a man, both good and bad.

From him I learned about presence. About showing up. About dependability. He taught me to connect with nature, to fish, to camp, to build things, to fix things. He taught me what it looks like to just be there. He also showed me how to repress emotions. To push them down and not acknowledge them. To run away from them.

Today, I’m sharing a story about witnessing something I’d never experienced before. On Thursday, I’ll share a story about how we’re working together on a renovation of the house I grew up in.

These stories are part of my Heart-Strong Adventure. I’m exploring where love and fear show up in our world, especially for men. And how freeing men from fear heals people, communities, and systems.

Saturday Morning. First Day of Hunting Season.

My dad and I were up on staging replacing second-floor windows. This renovation work has been going on for months. The house I grew up in needs work. More than 20 new windows. New siding. A bathroom overhaul. The work will likely take a year or more.

On Saturday morning we were focused on one thing. Getting a window in before the weather turned.

It was about 9:30am when a deer family walked out into the garden.

All summer long a doe and her two yearlings had been showing up. To say they enjoyed the garden is an understatement. They ate plenty of kale, Swiss chard, and carrot tops. They’d even started pulling leaves off the peach tree.

It’s a frustrating relationship. You’re trying to grow vegetables and you’re losing half or more to deer. But there’s also an understanding. If the opportunity presents itself during hunting season, you get those vegetables back. Deer are basically protein factories. They take the protein in plants and consolidate it into their muscles. Unintentionally, we were feeding them so they might feed us.

The deer hadn’t been out for a couple of days. And then on the first day of hunting season, they presented themselves.

The Moment

We were up on the staging. We watched them quietly. They watched us. They see that we’re there. It’s kind of eerie how comfortable they’d become with us from seeing us so much throughout the year.

The two little ones came out into the garden first. The mom stayed at the edge, watching over them. At one point one of the little ones was probably within 15 to 20 yards of the staging.

I asked my dad if he was going to try for the mom.

“If she turns and presents herself in a way I can get a clear shot at the heart,” he said.

She does.

He’d grabbed his shotgun to have it ready. The staging now became a makeshift tree stand. He does most of his hunting from a tree stand, so in a lot of ways this was familiar territory.

I watched as he lined up the shot and pulled the trigger.

Her back legs jumped up. She bolted into the woods. I thought he missed. I was about to say it.

Before I could speak, he said, “I got her right in the heart.”

“How could she run?”

“You noticed how her back legs jumped up? That’s an indication of a heart shot.”

I was expecting her to drop instantly. She didn’t. He explained that sometimes they can go a hundred yards or more.

He went off into the woods to track the blood and find her. He came back a few minutes later. She’d gone a couple hundred yards.

The Trail

This was the first time I’d ever witnessed the shooting of a mammal in person. And it would be the first time I dragged a dead animal out of the woods with the intent that it was going to be food and nourishment.

We followed the trail of blood through the woods. It was an interesting thing. Leaves turn red in the fall for a couple of reasons. They turn red when they’re changing colors. But they also turn red from blood.

Both represent death. Both also represent life. The leaves are dying. The dead leaves also become energy. They’ll decompose and feed the trees, fungi, ferns, and all the life in the forest.

The blood represents the death of another being. And that blood also represents life for the person who took it. The energy they’ll get to sustain themselves.

When we found her, she was laying lifeless on the ground. I just stood there looking at her. It was interesting. I felt deep sorrow for her. I also felt a deep sense of gratitude that she would be feeding us. That my parents and I would be getting energy and life from her death.

This idea of taking life to sustain a life. I think this was one of the first times I truly experienced it firsthand.

Dead Weight

We had to drag her about a hundred yards up to a trail where my dad could load her onto his tractor and bring her around to the barn. The idea of dead weight took on a whole new meaning. When you think about what survival used to be, how hard it was to do this for hundreds or maybe even thousands of yards. Or cutting it up and putting it in your pack to carry out.

Industrialization removes us from the physical and emotional work of getting our food. Think about the convenience of being able to go to a grocery store and have all that work done for you. But with that convenience comes distance and disconnection.

I kept looking at her eyes. She looked peaceful. Almost like she was sleeping with her eyes open. But I knew she wasn’t. I knew she was dead.

I felt a lot of gratitude and appreciation for that deer. For her helping to sustain other lives. Her little ones are at the age where they’re going to be fine on their own. They actually came back to the garden on Sunday. They’re well equipped to find their own food.

In many ways this is going to be a bonding experience between my father and me. Watching him take the life. Dragging her out of the woods together. Eventually butchering her together and putting the meat in the freezer. Maybe cooking it together and giving life to ourselves at some point.

A Heart Shot Comes from the Heart

There’s something about that interconnectedness. Aiming for the heart is the fast and humane way to take a life for your own sustenance without suffering. It’s skill. It’s intention. It’s minimizing pain.

This ties back to a post I wrote a few weeks ago about making a bow. About moving toward the sacred hunt. About developing a deep connection with the animal whose life and energy I’ll take to sustain my own.

I wrote about the range of feelings I thought I might experience. Gratitude. Awe. How quickly life can end. Surprise.

Saturday, I felt all of that. I felt surprise that a living being can travel so far once they’ve been shot in the heart. I felt sorrow. Deep sorrow not only for taking that animal’s life but taking the life of a mother.

It’s complicated. I can feel it in my stomach as I write about it. But at the same time, I think it brings you closer to yourself and your humanity in witnessing something like that.

Bringing It Full Circle on Sunday

On Sunday, I went to a wild food’s Thanksgiving. It was a potluck where everyone brought something to share with wild foods they harvested.

Among all the abundance of foraged plant-based dishes, there was also a decent amount of game meat. Venison of course. But also, things I’d never tried. Groundhog. Squirrel. Rabbit. I tried it all.

At one point we all got into a circle, and everyone shared what they are grateful for. The host, Arthur Haines, said death.

The acknowledgment that our life is dependent on the death of another living being. Whether it’s plant or animal. I feel like the more we disconnect from that truth, the more we disconnect from our own humanity.

What This Is Revealing to Me

This is what this experience is revealing to me in the context of my Heart-Strong Adventure.

The disconnection from death is rooted in fear. The connection to the full cycle of life is rooted in love. Love isn’t about avoiding death. It’s about honoring it fully. It’s about taking responsibility for the life that sustains yours.

These experiences with my dad are all threads. Building a bow. Renovating the house we both have history in. Saturday morning with the deer. They’re all about presence, connection, legacy, and what it means to show up. They’re about love.

And they’re all part of the same story. Learning what it means to live Heart-Strong.