Gramps!!

When I was young we used to go rifle hunting with Grandpa. Our whole family hunts and we would get together at our cabin the night before the opener and sit around and clean our guns and sharpen our knifes while we watched “Return of the Pink Panther”. It was a great tradition. Our cabin was heated by cast iron stoves so we would get a nice fire going before bed and it would die off sometime in the night. So it was cold in the mornings. My Grandpa would get up in the morning and stock up the fire so it would be nice and warm to get dressed. He would also get some water boiling for hot coco. Once things were warmed up he would fire up the record player with some loud marching band like music. We would all awake to this every morning, get dressed grab some hot coco and head up on the hill. Since the grand-kids weren’t old enough to hunt and didn’t want to go sit and freeze my Grandpa would set up by the trucks and get a real nice fire going for all the grand-kids while our fathers would go hunt. I remember one year where we were all up by the great fire grandpa built and we were playing a little football in the meadow. Grandpa slipped around this island of pine trees in the meadow trying to see if he could spot any deer. None of the grand-kids noticed him go around these trees. All of a sudden we heard a loud bang, we all jumped. Once we figured out where grandpa was we all ran around the island of trees to see Grandpa there with his gun and a two point flopping around in the field. My Gramps pulled out his 8 inch deer knife walked right up to the struggling deer stepped on its chest grabbed the antlers and slit its throat. I remember standing there and thinking WOW! What a memory. My Gramps is too old come up on the hill with us anymore put I know his spirit is with us ever time we go up to hunt. Thanks for the memories Gramps!!!