Annual Widow

Autumn is my favorite time of year; the leaves are falling carpets of molten colors, in shades of gold, ruby red, orange, and rust. The sumac is aflame and the animals are in a frenzy, fattening themselves up for the lean months ahead. The squirrels are scurrying everywhere, type "A" personalities in furry gray coats, hiding nuts by the seeming thousands. There is a subtle tension in the air; I can almost smell it outdoors, a kind of anticipation. The does are preening themselves girlishly, primping for their prom night. The bucks are rubbing their velvet tuxes off on the nearest tree and fighting each other to prove who is more worthy.

In other words, it's hunting season.

My husband hasn't had anyone to go hunting with since we married in 2001. I knew he was a hunter when I met him, because I met him in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where the only big things that happen every year are the hunting season and the Outhouse Races in Trenary in February. (Don't know where Trenary is? If you only knew what you're missing! It's the home of "Trenary Toast".)

In the U.P. of Michigan, everyone - and I do mean everyone - has a hunting camp. Some have been in the family for generations and have had more love and care lavished upon them than on the family homes. I know of one couple, who were good friends of ours, who had both a lovely family home and a 260-acre hunting camp with a five-bedroom, two bath cabin with two fireplaces, a stove, refrigerator, dishwasher, microwave, and sauna, all of which ran on the massive generator in a shed out back. The wife lives in her lovely home in town; the husband lives at camp. All year.

My husband yearns for a hunting camp of his own, but we live on a fixed income and it just isn't happening, at least until we either win the lottery or one of us goes to work.

The good news for my husband is, after two years of living in this new place where we don't know a soul except for my sister-in-law, someone has invited Jerry to go hunting with him. (He invited him yesterday morning at 10 am, opening day.) I haven't seen my husband move so fast since I married him. Before I knew it he had found everything colored blaze orange in the house (which is quite a trick, since it's all been packed away for two years), grabbed a thermos of coffee and his gun and was out the door. (I've been begging him to find the extra silverware that's packed away somewhere since we're down to two forks - he packed it - but he has no idea where it is, yet he found his blaze orange boxer shorts immediately.)

I'm a hunting widow.

Now, in the U.P. of Michigan, hunting season is just a given. It's going to happen, every year, come rain, shine, or tsunami, however unlikely that may be. The men spend weeks getting ready, laying in the cases of beer, canned goods, pasties (that will take a whole different post), chips, dips, and granola bars - oh, and let's not forget the peppermint schnapps. The women - well now, the women are going to their travel agents, buying their traveler's checks and the suntan lotion.

Because when it's hunting season, the women go south.

Now, technically, I am south. (We moved about five hours south two years ago.) Unfortunately, we don't have the money for me to go anywhere or even to go shopping, which is the other women's alternative during hunting season.

So here I am.

All in all, this is good. I'm good. I've got my diet pop in the refrigerator, my Special K bars in the cupboard, and my shearling slippers on my feet. I've got four brand new books I haven't even cracked the covers of yet. I know exactly where my husband is and when he'll be home (around 6 pm, for supper.) I know this is only going to last for two weeks.

But I've never wished so badly to be back home - home, in the quirky, backwoods, stuffed-full-of-deer-and-Yoopers Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where we know everybody and there's at least sixteen places I can think of to go, where at least one person will know my name and be happy to see me. Back home, even though the new trends don't filter down (or up, geographically) to the Yoopers until a year after they begin in New York or California, at least there's a mall, a huge library, and Lake Superior within twenty minutes' drive (I never grow tired of looking at Lake Superior.)

I guess I could go see my sister-in-law. She's nice and I like her, but sooner or later the conversation is going to come around to the fact that I'm going to go to hell because I'm not a Lutheran, and that will be that.

Oh, well. I guess I'll go get a Butterball for Thanksgiving - I know my husband will be home all day Thursday, at least - and maybe later I'll go online and find some really yummy venison recipes.

But being the hunting widow that I am, I'm resolved to start laying some pennies aside, because some day, if I'm going to be a hunting widow, I'm going to be a Yooper hunting widow again.

Happy Thanksgiving everybody!!