Performed properly, a deer hunt is a portal into another world

For the record, I considered taking this column off.

I figured I'd get the editors to hang a sign in the spot where they normally put me: "Andy Thompson is out of the office. His column will resume when he comes down from a tree stand in Fluvanna or Prince Edward or Caroline counties or wherever he is. Don't hold your breath."

Instead, I've emerged from the woods to bring you this dispatch. I do so reluctantly because, frankly, I'd much prefer to be out there still.

Every deer hunter has his reasons for looking forward to the season. I like venison just fine, and I love the mental exercise of hunting, but what I really enjoy is the feeling of stepping out of one world and into another. You put on different clothes, different smells and a different mindset and leave the everyday behind.

A good hunting experience is a dislocation in place and time. This can be accomplished in a day hunt, but the feeling isn't total. At least one overnight is needed to truly complete the effect.

Richmonder Mike Carroll, about whom I've written before, owns more than 200 acres of prime hardwoods, pines, fields and food plots in Fluvanna County. In the past 10 years, he's constructed the kind of deer camp that brings friends from far and wide. They come to slow down, to simplify, to shut off one part of the brain and turn on another. They come to live, even if for a brief time, by the rhythm of the sun and the moon and the wildlife around them.

This time of year, they come to hunt deer. That's why I was there Thursday and Friday. As usual, I wasn't alone. Carroll has many friends, and those who have spent a night in his woods rarely visit just once.

Carroll himself is the kind of guy who has his priorities straight. When I called Tuesday to see if he had come back from Fluvanna to vote, he laughed: "I already took care of that, brother."

He had voted early by absentee so he could hunt Tuesday.

I showed up Thursday evening just in time for sausages on the grill and ribald stories 'round the potbelly stove. Before turning in, I glanced up into the clear night sky and saw the Milky Way for the first time in ages.

Those same stars, and a risen moon, greeted us as we awoke well before dawn Friday. We finalized everyone's tree stand choice, talked about deer patterns to look for, guzzled some coffee and headed out.

I drew the morning shift in the "Hotel Stand," so named because of plush features such as a mostly intact canvas roof and camouflage fabric siding that partially conceals the hunter. The Hotel is attached to a white oak over a food plot field sown with chicory, clover and other deer delectables.

Sadly, I saw very little during the morning hunt. In the afternoon, at a different stand over different food plots, I seemed to hit similar luck - no sightings. In desperation, I gave a few grunts with the buck call hoping to scare up an interested buck in the fading light. It worked. In came a local celebrity: The Spike.

The Spike, Carroll had told me previously, was a mature buck, not a youth, with just two very large, very strangely shaped antlers. When I called, he came charging down a wooded hillside in front of me and out into the field below. I watched him through my scope. It was almost dark, but I had a clear shot.

I passed. Why? The everyday intruded. I knew I needed to get on the road to get back to a dinner engagement with friends. The field dressing would have made me late. And the next morning, when I would have to take the deer to be processed, I needed to be writing this column. (Now you know why I considered taking it off.)

So it goes, I guess, for the hunter trying to balance real life with life in the woods. We can hide for only so long.

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