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A flock of Western Blue Birds pitched and rolled out out of the breeze and alit in a nearby Juniper. It was really easy to see the beauty in those little winter visitors but that has not always been the case. Fourty years ago I would roll out of bed and Immediately press my face to the upstairs bedroom window and stare out at the towering cottonwoods that grew along the banks of the canal. If those trees were blowing in the breeze it was going to be a tough day shooting birds. That canal was my playground and the carnage I sent floating down it's muddy water was extreme at best. Rusty grew up a few years later and a few miles away but he aslo had an irrigation canal near his home and we sometimes shared childhood memories of all the good times that tall trees and running water can bring to a boy. As we ascended the ridge we would often stop to catch our breath and swap stories and I laughed out loud when Rusty told me that as a kid whenever he was grounded he had to stay inside and watch T.V., and that he was so hard on the dove population that he felt solely responsible for all of us losing the evening hunt. My dad chained up my Terrier and I had to stay inside also. We both had the acute ability to determine what was in our Christmas gifts by shaking them. The unmistakeable sound of daisy B.B.s rattling in their golden cardboard tubes, the heft of a brick of 22 long rifle Blazers, the sounds of chains that meant #3 longsprings or jumps. Santa pretty much had us figured out. We spoke of our Eberlestock packs, thousands of dollars in optics and my sixteen power scope. How in the world did we ever kill deer afield with just a pack of matches, a canteen of water, a knife and two peanut butter sandwiches down the front of our shirts? Seems like things were so much simpler back then. Eventually we topped out and peered off into a beautiful little pocket thick with Mountain Mahogany and scrub Oak. Both perplexed why no deer had been jumped in such a perfect place. I told Rusty of jumping a huge buck once atop a ridge like this and about how he had gotten out on me. I missed him three times later that same day. Rusty spoke of probably walking past a thousand deer in his life back when we just pounded country and busted brush. The more miles on the boots, the better odds at success. I'm sure that was his plan. To stay bedded in the thick scrub on the knife edge ridge we were on. Ten yards to my left, the route Rusty was taking through the small saddle was just going to be too close for the bucks comfort. He exploded from his bed at fifteen yards and Rusty yelled "buck" as we bolted towards the edge where we were sure he was headed. The Ruger #1 found it's home in my shoulder, a glimpse of width and mass on his left side, he sagged at the shot. Fifty yards away the twitching bear grass marked his passage, just like the old days.