Hell in a Handbasket

It was a long time ago, coming up on 20 years. I had saved up for more than a year to pay for a hunting trip down in Texas. If I remember correctly, Ohio only allowed one deer to be harvested per tag back then while Texas allowed six. Time for a trip to the Lone Star State.

I had paid for ten days of hunting at a private lodge. The other patrons were doctors and lawyers and other professionals. They’d sit around the main house all day, drinking to excess, eating huge meals, and playing hand after hand of poker. It seems that they were happy enough to get away from their wives for a time, actually going out in the bush wasn’t on the agenda. After they found out that I was only interested in hunting they asked me to fill their tags as well so they’d have something to show for their annual trip besides stories about the one that got away.

We’re talking about hitting the hunting jackpot, guys. And it was my first time out.

The immigrant family which took care of the place butchered the deer, sending a few heads off to the taxidermist and filling the walk-in freezer with steaks. Eventually the card players decided that they wanted to get as much meat as possible, so they told the caretakers to make venison sausage. Grind up the marginal cuts, add fat and spices, and stuff it in a tube.

One problem. Not enough fat.

I was walking back to the lodge one hot and dusty day when I saw a sounder of wild boar on a hill ahead of me. They were a fair distance away, about 500 yards or so, but I knew that they’d scatter into the heavy brush by the side of the road just as soon as one of them spotted me. I also knew that they were wary and cunning beasts, and they’d get wind of me in a minute or two. Either take the shot or let it go by.

So I carefully aimed and squeezed off a round. I managed to hit my target, but I hadn’t made allowances for the fact that the pigs were on that damn hill and higher than I was. Instead of hitting just behind the shoulder, I severed the boar’s spine.

The rest of the herd galloped away while the one I shot screamed and trotted off into the scrub, it’s back legs flopping uselessly behind it. It couldn’t have gone far, and I wasn’t about to let an animal suffer. I worked the bolt and checked my ammo supply, 2 rounds for the rifle and one fully loaded .38 Special. I chambered the next round before I walked up the road, but all I found was a blood trail heading off into the bushes. So I followed it.

I’m not sure what was growing around there, but it had thorns as long as my pinky. I was wearing one of those down vests, and it started to tear and rip right away. I only got a few feet off the road when I started to wonder how the pigs managed to ghost through the vegetation without effort. When I got to a clear spot I bent waaayyy over and looked around at knee height.

There were little paths and corridors down there, trails in the dirt under the bushes like tunnels lined with barbed wire. 30 feet away was my pig, looking at me with furious little eyes set above wickedly sharp tusks. If I had taken two more steps he might have decided to take me to hog heaven with him.

It rattled me a bit, seeing those tusks and that patient animal waiting until I got close enough to use them on me. I decided to shoot him from where I was, which was a good idea. But the rifle was borrowed, and I didn’t want to get it too dirty or scuffed up. That’s why I decided to take the shot from my upside down position, which was stupid in the extreme.

It was awkward as all hell, but I hit him square in the left shoulder. When we butchered him that night we found that the bullet shattered the shoulder, collapsed his left lung and exited out the rear. Even so, even after two ought six rounds and only one working leg, he stood up and thought about charging!

That was enough for me. I flopped down on my belly, worked the bolt, and put my last round into his forehead. This little piggy was going to market.

I got up and walked over to the body. Huh. Somehow it looked bigger when it was out on the hillside. It was heavier than the small size would account for, though. He was maybe 140 pounds.

I grabbed the pig by the front legs and took two dragging steps towards the road when something that sounded like a steam engine shrieked and charged me through the bush. There was just time for one of those terrible moments of shock, fear running like cold poison through my heart while I stared at another pig. This one was much bigger than the boar that had soaked up three high powered rifle rounds before dying, and I remember hoping that it wouldn't hurt too much before I followed. Then I was startled out of my frozen state when I felt something nuzzle into my palm like the nose of a lapdog that thinks you’ve been on the computer for too long without petting it.

That’s when the big pig piled into me. Suddenly it was like I was inside a dryer. The ground was over my head, now it smashed into my face. I was scraped and torn by a thorn bush, then I was snatched back out and shaken like a rat in a terrier’s mouth. I was tenderized, went through the spin cycle, and tossed around like my 180 pounds were nothing. And all through it was that terrible, terrible shrieking.

Then, like a switch was thrown, there was peace.

I could see the blue sky peeking through the dusty thorn scrub. Feathers were floating down and settling with tickling kisses on my face. It felt like I was one big bruise, but I couldn’t feel any stabbing pain when I breathed so I knew that my ribs were alright. I was lying on some rocks, but it wouldn’t matter if I rested for a minute before moving off of them.

The only thing that bothered me was this annoying tapping sound. It was like someone was slapping two pebbles together, again and again. What was most puzzling was that it seemed to be coming from underneath me.

Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap,,,,,,

Got annoying fast. So I heaved myself around to see who was making that freakin’ noise and ask them to stop.

It was my .38. The grip was in my right hand and I was pulling the trigger over and over and over. The muzzle was against the pig’s head, right in between the eyes.

The boar had hooked my down vest in it’s tusks, lucky for me because otherwise my ribs would have been ripped right out of my chest. All those feathers had come from the ruined vest, torn to shreds as the havelina furiously tried to throw me off.

And the friendly dog which had nuzzled my hand? That was the grip of the .38 as I reached for it by instinct.

It took me a few minutes to get my wits back and wriggle out of what was left of the vest. First thing I did was reload the .38 because it would have been bad manners to let a friend go hungry. Then I dragged the carcasses out to the road to wait for the camp pickup to come around. They were leaner than farm raised pigs, but we managed to get enough lard off of the two so we could finish making sausage.

The pig which tried so hard to gore me was a female, weighing in at 230 pounds or so. Might have been the first one’s momma, I dunno. She made the best carnitas that I’ve ever had.

There’s more than one moral to this story. The first is that everything that eats meat just plain loves pork. That means wild boar have to be tough as nails and hell on hooves just to survive. Make sure that you’ve got a clean shot and enough gun to do the job.

The second lesson is that you never just wound and let it run off. The next person who comes across the boar you hurt probably won’t go home that night because it will be in a foul mood.

The third lesson is that it’s not living well that’s the best revenge. Its eating well. In the years since that trip my belly has grown, my muscles have shrunk, and my days of wrestling wild boar in the dirt are behind me. But when I go to a Mexican restaurant I usually order a dish with pork in it so I can relive my glory days.

And what's my favorite Chinese dish? General Tso's Chicken. But that's another story.

(Click on the image above for a larger picture.)

This post was originally written a few years ago. The only advantage I can find to having a spat with your old blog host and having to start all over again with another service is that you can present old material as fresh.

Chris heard this story and immediately said "When are we going to go hunting in Texas?" I am not sure what this says about the fellow, except that he is certainly a lot braver than I was at his age.