Hunting

Many of you know I have a profound aversion for anything "hunting." I went to a store called Cabella's in UT the other day and almost threw up because of the hundreds of dead animals on display--including a grizzly bear and mountain lion. Although this aversion is basically irrational ( I eat meat often and realize those cows suffer a lot more than the deer), I am attempting to explain it here and now.

Story 1:
When I was a child, my grandfather would feed stray cats in the neighborhood. One such infamous cat was named blacky. He was always super mangy and frightening. At one point he attacked my grandpa who is diabetic and subsequently had to go to the hospital. I was under the impression that the cat broke and ripped up his arm, when really he only got a few cuts. Understandably, I was always terrified to enter their house for fear that blacky would be lurking, waiting for me. One day we road tripped up to my grandparent's home (12 hours in the car as a small child) and I was totally fried. We walked up onto the driveway to see this:


Some birds were eating blacky's cat food, which was unacceptable to g-pa because he so dearly loved the devil. So, logically, my grandpa had his GUN BARREL out the window pointing at the walk way (meaning me, as a small child) and had recently shot a bird which was flailing around, bloody and dying before my eyes. He told us to throw it in the trash which we would not do, so he came out and shot it a few more times. It still didn't die, but was thrown to its stinky grave still violently thrashing around.

Story 2:
My family took a backpacking trip to the wind river mountains. We fished during the day to catch dinner. I didn't really have a problem hooking them because it seemed pretty adult-ish and adventurous. My dad would remove the fish from the line and in one neat, swift crack, would whack the fish head, leaving it dead within seconds. Neat and tidy.
So, one afternoon my dad went up to get the fish cooking and left my little brother and I to get some more for dinner. Easy. We caught one and that is where everything went drastically wrong. We were unable to kill the fish:



We whacked his head repeatedly, guts and blood flying everywhere and all over us, but IT WOULD NOT DIE. Flailing and still alive, it totally freaked me out. We couldn't kill it but were making it suffer badly. Finally, screaming and covered in guts, we ran up to camp where my dad, surprised and alarmed, killed the dang thing with one hit.

And that, all you stalker boys, is why hunting is my deal-breaker.

*My uncle later shot blacky at the bequest of my grandmother, who was afraid she would get eaten alive. But never tell my grandfather--he thought the cat wandered away and died a peaceful death.