Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/742011
worse than when I drew one of the rare- as-hen's-teeth nonresident desert bighorn permits in Arizona. Concentration on anything other than the hunt proved impossible, so I pretty much quit trying. As a result, the yard looks like a moonscape and my garage an abandoned refugee camp. For the first time in my life, none of that matters. As I struggle to write these words, only a handful of days remain before the hunt begins. I'm trying hard to button up all the little things so I can lose myself in the experience, but my thoughts keep scattering like a flush of late-season quail. More than anything else, I'm humbled by the good fortune of it all. Ross is going with me. We'll start scouting with Chris three days before season, hoping to discover the kind of ram that makes us forget all the others. If luck is with us, we'll bed him down the night before opening day. Then together we'll work our way back in long before daylight. Once in position, Ross and I will wait shoulder-to- shoulder for the sun and hope the ram is right where we left him. If he is, I'll take the shot. If he isn't, so what? I'll just sling the rifle and hunt until we find him. There is no reason to hurry. I have already waited 33 years, so an hour, or a day, or even a week or two more doesn't matter. n Editor's Note: The author's 288-page book, Born a Hunter – Hunting Adventures from the Arctic to Africa, is available in a trade edition—hardbound with dust jacket for $30 and Deluxe— leather-bound and limited to 350 signed and numbered copies for $60. Call (800) 849-1004 or visit www.sportingclassics.com. 86 • S P O R T I N G C L A S S I C S