Читать книгу Ten Bridges Seven Churches No Stop Light - Rodney Earl Andrews - Страница 7

Friday

Brush off all the chalk dust and clear chalk rails.

Soak a soft rag with warm water and rub it generously into a Sunlight soap bar.

Soap the slate, do all six slates.

Start with the first and wipe off before the slates are dry.

Jake’s mom would not miss small pieces of Sunlight bar soap. Jake was curious to see if the instructions on the note worked. At the end of the next school day, Jake took longer than usual to bring in some firewood. He was hoping the school would clear, so he could try Sunlight soap on a side slate board. Each week the boards got blacker and blacker and easier to write on. The school inspector even praised Miss Small on how she maintained all the boards in the school. Jake’s mom was happy to supply a new big bar of Sunlight. One Friday, after everyone had left for the weekend, Jake was in the process of soaping the slates, when the door flew open, and in came Miss Small to pick up a stack of marking that she had left behind. She took one look at Jake and the boards and said nothing. Jake was sure she winked.

Needless to say, in the spring, the school trustee could not believe that the wood shed was completely empty. Jake was hired to fill the shed for the next fall. When Jake moved on to high school at the end of grade eight, the school trustee decided it was time to put in an oil furnace. No other student would have the responsibility and fun that Jake had enjoyed for four years.

With all this practice, keeping the hunting camp warm would be a piece of cake for Jake. He soon had everyone sitting in their undershirts.

Hunting camps are passed down from generation to generation and many a man wished that his long life would end at camp. A neighbour, Mr Payne, no close relation to Jake, died on the hunt under the arms of a large maple tree while on morning watch. This was the way to go, doing the things you loved to do. Mr. Payne’s death made room for Jake at the hunt camp.

Father, son, brother, uncle, neighbours, and friends, all men with a common interest in hunting deer, made up most of the camps around the Norwood area. Each camp and hunting area supported a limited number of hunters. Openings came up only when people moved away from the area or when age, disease or illness overtook someone. Fathers always had the first opportunity to invite their sons. If there were no sons, other names would be discussed and a consensus would be reached about who would be invited for the next year. Jake’s dad was a wise master at inviting new members, as good chemistry among the group made for a more enjoyable hunt. The temporary tribe replaced the outside world and the yearly draw to the camp bound men together.

In his second year at camp, Jake was expected to take over some of the kitchen duties, and he quickly volunteered to make the morning snack for the men to take out with them with their coffee on the first hunt of the day. Jake’s favourite breakfast snack was a fried-egg sandwich. A little bacon, two eggs with the yolk broken, over-easy twice, put between two pieces of homemade bread, toasted with a little splatter of mayonnaise, and wrapped in waxed paper. This was a welcome treat out on the deer run.

On the first day of the hunt that year, three bucks were shot. One large and two averaged-size deer were hung from the large oak tree by the camp. Deer were bled, gutted, and then hung in a tree or from a large post stand until the hunt was over. A stand is like the gate opening that you expect to see at the entrance to a cattle ranch. The main difference is that the upright posts on a deer stand are supported on all four sides, so the weight of a carcass will not tip the stand. The stand was always placed close to camp and a rifle shot would discourage any poacher - human or animal. A carcass was hung with the head and hide still on. Hanging the deer served a number of purposes. Bears, coyotes, and other animals could not make off with the catch or chew away at it. More importantly, the meat had a chance to start aging so it would be more tender and easier to prepare.

In Norwood a number of families would come home from the hunt to hang deer carcasses on a tree in the front yard or on the eave of a tall shed. Rusaws, La Brashes, and the Shoups always had the largest line of hanging game. One year, in the big elm on the La Brashes’ front lawn, hung a bull moose. It made deer carcasses look tiny.

Highway # 7 was filled with cars heading back to the city with deer on their front and back fenders. Half-ton trucks were not as common in the sixties as they are today. Anyone with the luxury of time to sit and watch, would have counted over one hundred deer per hour going from hunt camps back to the city. This traffic would continue for a week to ten days from morning to night. People who watched this parade were often envious, wishing they themselves had been fortunate enough to have such success in the hunt.