Connections

My roommate shot a deer on Thursday and yesterday was my first time skinning an animal ever; it was not nearly as bad as I thought it would be. In fact it even drove me to want to get a rifle so I will be able to provide for myself with meat for next winter. I have saved the skin from the deer and plan on turning the fur into a nice pair of mittens because I assume they have evolved through their thousands of years on earth to have a fairly well Gore-Tex outer-layer.
As we skinned the animal together I felt as though I was part of the kill as I used a knife to cut into his hind-quarters and slowly pealed the fur off the back like a t-shirt. This is how Logan explained how to remove the coat and at first it truly disgusted me but I realized this animal had given his life so we would be able to eat throughout the winter. I felt it was essential to utilize every piece of the animal because other than the fact I am rather poor at the moment, I also believe it is important to use each part of the animal just as natives did. This brought me back to Henderson the Rain King and how all the remote tribes he visits are connected to the land and animals surrounding them because without them they would not exist. This also relates to another story my roommates told me from when they went hunting in a undisclosed spot where a group of North Dakotans had shot a cow elk and let it wander off and die without searching for it. This is disrespectful decision to the elk because they killed an animal that dozens if not hundreds of people would have loved to kill themselves so they could provide for their family through the winter. Instead these NorDak's just let the animal die in pain instead of doing what Logan had to do and slit the animals throat because the animal was wheezing and slowly passing away. This is probably the strongest connection a person can have to the animal because as he went to cut into the throat the animal just stared him in the eyes until their was no longer a pulse.

                         Thought this photo was pretty funny; NOT Logan
Too often these days people throw out old clothes and other possessions that have lost value instead of passing them along to people who are less fortunate. Everything has a value and can be utilized in a way that is still effective, hell you can use tendons from the deer to make your own bow and the bone to make arrows (I have another friend working on this right now) and this I believe is the first step to stopping waste.