This December piece was so profound for me on many levels, and I am compelled now to respond. When I first hunted deer, elk and antelope in the mid 1970's, my partner and mentor was from a line of subsistence hunting loggers, and the sole criterion was meat - any season, any gender, any time. Concern for the animal was limited to a close, clean shot where compassion was more or less sidelined in favor of filling the freezers and keeping an eye out for the warden. As the years passed and I was exposed to sportspeople and started bow hunting, there was a welcome shift not only towards compassion, but towards a sense of the links between all living things and what a fine, fine line, if any, separates the 'inner' from the 'outer.' During a body work session in India in the 90's, decades and continents away from the Rocky Mountains, I had a traumatic experience. As she deeply worked my chest it triggered insufferable emotional pain and tears. It was around images I had retained of the elk chests I had ripped open during field "dressing." When it was over I realized a repressed horror that I never knew existed as the result of all the violence I had ignored. I realized then that if I were to hunt again - and this was not a given - I would have to absorb, deeply, indigenous ways of approaching the hunt. Be well.
Dec 2, 2022·edited Dec 2, 2022Liked by Antonia Malchik
I enjoy your writing about moving through your part of Montana. In my book club we have read a number of books that focused on the founding and ongoing mission of the National Forest Service. There is some irony in your beautiful photograph of the old logging road. Even logging roads are indicative of market distortion I am afraid. While the NFS certainly has multiple missions, from the beginning it has focused heavily on taking stands of trees that MIGHT NOT BE ECONOMICALLY HARVESTED and building the roads for private interests which makes it a "good deal". Clearly without forest management, there would be even more fires so I understand the issue. It is most interesting that even in those cases, government works hand in hand with industry to allow them to privatize their gain (and socialize the loss), ie. taxpayers maintain the logging road. It is these sorts of policies that are never on the chopping block when we harangue over "waste, fraud, and abuse).
I love how you write about hunting, your children's amusement, the different ways of understanding our relationship with the land, what/how we eat. I also love that commune keeps popping up for you--those accidents of misreading are when meaning opens up, as you write about finding in such a deeply layered way. And Enheduanna! I want more people to know about that history, excited for the link!
I don't buy the "honoring the animal" bullshit when it comes to grip and grin photos. If you're a Christian, do you selfie yourself taking communion? Well, don't answer that, considering how many people selfie themselves meditating, praying, whatever, because if you're that type of person you probably do when you can get away with it. None of that is ceremony, it's a decent level of "hey, look at me and what I did/do!" narcissism, which certainly has its place ... this just isn't it.
It's the same people who claim that using a Native theme for a sports team mascot is "honoring" Indigenous people. I find it enormously off-putting.
I loved the Kinship anthology, Nia. Speaking of art, I saw a great quote today by Tom Cox, a writer in the UK and author of _21st-Century Yokel_: "the way the world is set up today, if you're making art, music, writing books, even if you're doing it well and making people happy, it's so easy to feel you're not doing enough because it's so hard to earn a living from it. But remember: that's not your fault. It's the era's."
Oh! I like that bit about the meaning of life (needs, relationships) and shifting that to creating a system to accommodate "living" that doesn't degrade the system has me off on a total tangent re: human resources.
Thank you for taking us along with you on your hunt and in the cold and back to living in common!
Thank you for taking us out into the woods with you. You make me want to be a hunter, which is really saying something, given my decades of vegetarianism! Also, you reminded me to get tickets for the Hunter exhibit about Enheduanna, and you helped me to find a Christmas present for my niece (the Kinship anthology). So thank you for all of those gifts.
Antonia,
This December piece was so profound for me on many levels, and I am compelled now to respond. When I first hunted deer, elk and antelope in the mid 1970's, my partner and mentor was from a line of subsistence hunting loggers, and the sole criterion was meat - any season, any gender, any time. Concern for the animal was limited to a close, clean shot where compassion was more or less sidelined in favor of filling the freezers and keeping an eye out for the warden. As the years passed and I was exposed to sportspeople and started bow hunting, there was a welcome shift not only towards compassion, but towards a sense of the links between all living things and what a fine, fine line, if any, separates the 'inner' from the 'outer.' During a body work session in India in the 90's, decades and continents away from the Rocky Mountains, I had a traumatic experience. As she deeply worked my chest it triggered insufferable emotional pain and tears. It was around images I had retained of the elk chests I had ripped open during field "dressing." When it was over I realized a repressed horror that I never knew existed as the result of all the violence I had ignored. I realized then that if I were to hunt again - and this was not a given - I would have to absorb, deeply, indigenous ways of approaching the hunt. Be well.
So tell if you will/can: was it an intentional miss?
I loved reading this. So much to ponder.
I enjoy your writing about moving through your part of Montana. In my book club we have read a number of books that focused on the founding and ongoing mission of the National Forest Service. There is some irony in your beautiful photograph of the old logging road. Even logging roads are indicative of market distortion I am afraid. While the NFS certainly has multiple missions, from the beginning it has focused heavily on taking stands of trees that MIGHT NOT BE ECONOMICALLY HARVESTED and building the roads for private interests which makes it a "good deal". Clearly without forest management, there would be even more fires so I understand the issue. It is most interesting that even in those cases, government works hand in hand with industry to allow them to privatize their gain (and socialize the loss), ie. taxpayers maintain the logging road. It is these sorts of policies that are never on the chopping block when we harangue over "waste, fraud, and abuse).
Eager to give the Pondercast podcast a try.
I love how you write about hunting, your children's amusement, the different ways of understanding our relationship with the land, what/how we eat. I also love that commune keeps popping up for you--those accidents of misreading are when meaning opens up, as you write about finding in such a deeply layered way. And Enheduanna! I want more people to know about that history, excited for the link!
I don't buy the "honoring the animal" bullshit when it comes to grip and grin photos. If you're a Christian, do you selfie yourself taking communion? Well, don't answer that, considering how many people selfie themselves meditating, praying, whatever, because if you're that type of person you probably do when you can get away with it. None of that is ceremony, it's a decent level of "hey, look at me and what I did/do!" narcissism, which certainly has its place ... this just isn't it.
It's the same people who claim that using a Native theme for a sports team mascot is "honoring" Indigenous people. I find it enormously off-putting.
I loved the Kinship anthology, Nia. Speaking of art, I saw a great quote today by Tom Cox, a writer in the UK and author of _21st-Century Yokel_: "the way the world is set up today, if you're making art, music, writing books, even if you're doing it well and making people happy, it's so easy to feel you're not doing enough because it's so hard to earn a living from it. But remember: that's not your fault. It's the era's."
Oh! I like that bit about the meaning of life (needs, relationships) and shifting that to creating a system to accommodate "living" that doesn't degrade the system has me off on a total tangent re: human resources.
Thank you for taking us along with you on your hunt and in the cold and back to living in common!
Thank you for taking us out into the woods with you. You make me want to be a hunter, which is really saying something, given my decades of vegetarianism! Also, you reminded me to get tickets for the Hunter exhibit about Enheduanna, and you helped me to find a Christmas present for my niece (the Kinship anthology). So thank you for all of those gifts.