The Bearded Lady

Do you ever find yourself doing something and wonder how you got there? I spent this last weekend in a place I have never been, hanging out with a guy I never imagined hanging out with, on a farm I had seen numerous times on my television. Is this real? I asked myself that very question numerous times between Thursday evening, and still, a few days after I have returned home. I wonder if it will ever seem real.

I saw a post on Instagram back in April, from Doug Duren, who I am a fan of, not only for his guest appearances on the MeatEater television show and podcast, although that IS how I discovered him, but also for his timber and wildlife

conservation efforts on his family farm. He posted that he was going to allow a few "newbie" turkey hunters on his private property to hunt, in exchange for some work on his farm. He has dubbed this program "Earn Your Hunt". It's to help develop relationships between private land owners and the folks who want to gain hunting access to those properties. Well, if you know anything about me at all, you know that I am a struggling, self taught turkey hunter, so I couldn't message him fast enough. Thankfully, he responded and told me to get an over the counter tag, and come on up. The message alone was surreal.

Fast forward to May 17th, myself and my best friend, Sarah, with all of our hunting gear, and what seemed like everything else we owned, packed into my Chevy Colorado, headed north. We couldn't believe we were going to hunt on Doug Duren's farm. We couldn't believe that we were going to stay in the same farm house, that Steven Rinella, Janis Putelis and the rest of the MeatEater crew had stayed in and filmed their hunting show. We couldn't believe this shit!!

Sarah asked me, as we drew near Cazenovia, if I was nervous to meet Doug. I didn't know how to answer, because let's be honest, in this day and age with social media, in addition to listening to him on the podcasts, you feel like you know people you've never met. But a little bit of me was nervous, mainly because I held him in such high regard, I didn't want to be disappointed. I think you always feel that way when you meet a public figure. You just don't want them to turn out to be an asshole. Thankfully, Doug was no asshole, not even close. 

I'm not going to pretend I know him well, but what little I do know, after this past weekend, is that I will no longer categorize him as "the guy on MeatEater that lives in Wisconsin". Doug was amazing. I don't have the space here to give a minute by minute account of our encounter, but I can tell you this, he made an impression on me that I didn't expect. He hunted with us on Friday, but we didn't get a bird that morning. We walked the farm and he gave us the lay of the land so we could plan the hunts for the next few days. We looked for morels and we took some time on a hillside, overlooking the farm and just talked. We took a Kubota ride to see the rest of the farm, and wow, is it beautiful. The love and respect he has for this place, just exuded from his words as he spoke to us about his childhood growing up there, his present efforts to keep the farm healthy, and his thoughts about what the future will bring. You don't talk to many folks these days, that hold their heritage in such high regard.

It was fun listening to the stories of Rinella, and others we are "fans" of, and their hunting experiences on the Duren farm. Doug is so fond of these folks, and the time he has been able to spend with them, that was obvious when he spoke of them. And really, I don't know if there are two bigger fans of Steven Rinella and the MeatEater "machine" than Sarah and I. Yes, two chicks, who have listened to every podcast and often have full blown conversations about what we learned on the latest episode. Hey, I never said that we were typical ladies. I mean, we ditched our men and drove seven hours, to go crawl through poison ivy, pee in the woods, get virtually no sleep and chase those damn turkeys all over hell's half acre. We live for this stuff!

I killed my very first turkey EVER, on Saturday morning, at 8 am. It was a BEARDED HEN!!  I am totally OK with that, although some have declared that they would have passed on that bird. I had a full blown debate with myself, and Sarah, as the hen moved closer to our decoy. Finally, after Sarah uttered the magic words "if you don't shoot it, I'm going to", I got the bead of my 20 gauge shotgun on her neck, and I pulled the trigger. I was a little overwhelmed by what had happened, as I have been trying to kill a turkey for four long years, and I had never even had one walk in front of me, until that moment. I never heard the gun go off, I never felt the butt stock slam into my cheek. Sarah was shaking, I was shaking....it was crazy! After texting my boyfriend, Chance and then my Dad, to tell them the good news, I was finally ably to take a breath.

Doug's genuine excitement when we got back to the farm house is something I will never ever forget. It made me feel so proud, similar to how I imagine I would have felt, had my dad been there. It is a moment I will hold onto for as long as I live. This kind of stuff just doesn't happen to me, like ever. But it WAS happening and I was going to soak up every moment of it. We took pictures and retold the whole story a few more times before we decided to call it a morning. After all, Sarah and I had more work to do, to earn our keep, before going back out that evening to try to get Sarah a bird.

We hunted our butts off Saturday evening and Sunday morning, to get a shot at the "Gang of Five", which was a group of gobblers that seemed inseparable. She had some great action from the birds and one good possibility, on Sunday, but it just didn't come together.

This trip was more incredible than I could have ever imagined. The hospitality from Doug and his incredible wife, Tricia, was nothing I could have expected. The laughs were plenty, the sleep was near nonexistent, but the conversations are what will stick with me. Yes, I killed my very first bird, yes I had my best friend there with me to experience this whole trip, we physically stayed in the same house as Steven Rinella, and yes, we met, and got to hang out with the famous (at least in our minds) Doug Duren. But as weird as it may be for me to say, with all of that other excitement going on, my favorite part of this entire experience was a moment that the three of us took, on the tall hillside, overlooking the farm, where we just sat and talked. We talked about random things, some serious, some not, but we took about 45 minutes on that hillside and had genuine conversation. That was everything to me.

I'm still trying to figure out how I got there, how I got the opportunity in the first place. When you find a person whom you just feel at ease with and have so many things in common with, like hunting, horticulture, arboriculture, Monty Python, yes, I said Monty Python, you realize that maybe you were put there for a reason. No clue what that reason is, but I'm not going to question it anymore. I may have went to Cazenovia, Wisconsin a fan of Doug Duren, and all I thought he was, but I came back to Indiana feeling like a friend to Doug, and I wouldn't hesitate to drop everything, to make that seven hour drive back up there, if he or Tricia ever needed anything. Sure they have plenty of people way higher on their list of contacts they could call, but I hope I left the impression that they can put me on that list somewhere, as well. 

Today is the day....

"You should write a blog". I hear this from time to time, but I have to wonder, what exactly does one write about, to catch and hopefully keep, the interest of, well, anyone? That's a damn good question.

So today is the day, the day I write something, and send it out there, to either be read or not, but either way, it's happening.

I am a strange duck, or so I'm told. I don't really fit a mold, I am not on a specific side, I am unique in that I don't follow a crowd, or believe in things just because my friends, or society believes in them. But getting to this point has been quite the journey. I suppose this is the "getting to know you" phase of our relationship, huh? Ok, here goes:

I was born and raised in central Indiana. I have two older brothers, and my parents divorced when I was 11, technically, my mom left, but that's neither here nor there, at this point. My dad raised me, and he is, and will always be, the number one dude in my life.  I still reside about 45 minutes from my childhood home, with my other half, aka boyfriend, Chance. I am what some young turds call "middle aged", at 41. I played every sport I could, during my youth, soccer, basketball, volleyball, track, barrel racing, golf, etc. I was a sports junkie, to say the least. I won 10 varsity letters in high school and was looked at, to continue both, basketball and softball, in college, but I passed. I was BEAT UP, and figured that if I had no interest in the actual schoolwork part of the college experience, I knew I would be in trouble.

So fast forward in to my early twenties, I married and instantly regretted it. I stayed in a physically and verbally abusive marriage for 11 years. He was older, by quite a bit, I was young and dumb, thinking I could change him. Yeah, not so much. I divorced (escaped) at 35 years of age. My twenties and half of my thirties were gone, along with every ounce of self esteem and confidence, I once had. What had happened to this strong, athletic, young woman who was afraid of virtually nothing? I had become anxious, a heavier weight than I had ever been, afraid of most all social situations, and had no clue who I was anymore.

I dated a kid I went to school with, back in the day, not long after divorcing. Mistake, once again. It was OK, there was companionship, but it was his family I loved, not him. He did get me involved in a small town church, and I made some amazing friendships there, so there was a bright side to an otherwise boring relationship. We split, which was fine, because I was ready to be alone for a while.

Several months later, I met Chance, on, of all things, a dating website. Yeah, that really happened. We hit it off, via many hours of long, phone conversations then after a few weeks, we decided to meet in person. Here we are, 6 years later, still going strong. I also gained an amazing bonus kid in this relationship, who I love like she was my own. Kids were never part of my plan, but neither was getting the crap knocked out of me for most of my twenties and thirties, so there's that.

I'll be 42 in June, I don't drink alcohol, I try to eat more healthy than not, but Chick-fil-a and Reece's cups are my weaknesses, I am an Arborist, as well as, a Horticulturist (plant geek), I became a deer hunter at age 36, I am currently learning how to turkey hunt, I am an avid angler, a new supporter of all things public lands, I like dogs more than most people, I started running two years ago after a re-aggravated shoulder injury ended my Crossfit adventure, I just ran my very first half marathon on May 5th of this year, I have very few friends, due to the whole "socializing" thing, I have short hair and absolutely don't care, I have had 4 knee surgeries, two shoulder surgeries, I suffer from chronic myofascial pain disorder, anxiety, and I am opinionated AF, according to my boyfriend's dad. That is the speed round version stats.

That is me, and an overview of my crazy journey to this point. Many stories to tell, that will certainly relate back to more specific details of my past, which I will hit on regularly in this blog, down the road.

I want to put my story out there, because there is a small chance, that something I say can help someone in some way, or fashion. Maybe I can get someone to leave their abuser, maybe I can get another woman interested in hunting, or maybe I can encourage someone to start running because  running really doesn't suck as bad as it sounds (OK, it does suck, but the rewards are so worth it, think Reece's cups). So join me, this average, middle aged, washed-up athlete, who is discovering that life in my forties, is turning out to be the most kick ass time of my life......so far.

Stay tuned,

Cindy