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If you didn’t bring jerky, what did I just eat?

March 10th, 2008 Robin - Pinney

Bill Heavey is known to some folks for writing the “Sportsman’s Life” column in Field & Stream.   He’s unlike any outdoorsman I’ve ever known in that he, frankly and with great humor, tells the truth about his outdoor debacles.  None of those ”I had a eighty-pound fish on the hook but a freak earthquake tossed me a mile into the air and I lost him just before landing in Timbuktu.  If it hadn’t'a been for that earthquake…” excuses for him.  If You Didn’t Bring Jerky, What Did I Just Eat? Misadventures in Hunting, Fishing, and the Wilds of Suburbia is a collection of some of his finest tales.

Heavey obviously loves the outdoors, and he thinks it one of the biggest jokes of the universe that he gets paid to do what he loves best for cobbling together a short story every month about his misadventures.  He’s funny, which I find hard to resist, but you’ll see he’s also got a very soft heart when you read the chapters about his infant daughter who died and about his joy in sharing the outdoors with his other daughter, Emma.

Have you ever found yourself in your tree stand of a morn, pantless and in your slippers?  Bill knows your shame.  Ever just plain old missed a shot?  Bill’s right there with you.  If you’ve ever accidentally run over a squirrel while driving, gone back, scooped the furry form off the road and driven it to the nearest vet for emergency care, this book may not be for you.  But having spent my life around hunters and in hunting states, I’ve (unscientifically and undoubtedly with personal bias) divided hunters into two groups: good and and not-so-good.  The not-so-good hunters can still be good people, but hunt drunk and/or kill for the sake of killing.  The good hunters can still be bad people, but would wait all season for an appropriately aged and gendered animal, take very careful aim, and consume the entire animal.  Bill Heavey made my good hunter and fisherman list.

Entry Filed under: Nonfiction