So 2012 was my big hunting year, so far. My first big Colorado elk hunt, and it was a amazing experience and tremendous success. A rousing tale, in its own right. It was my buddy Keegan and his father and uncle and me. The same characters from the story where I have to poop in the snow. Sweet memories.
But this tiny tale is about Dwight's Buck knife.
I noticed it right away, it's handle swaddled in copious amounts of duct tape, but a Buck Special nonetheless. I asked Keegan earlier today for some backstory on this blade, and he told me that the handle was broken on the very first use. Back in the 90s sometime, being pounded thru a breastbone or somesuch, fixed with the tape and used faithfully ever since.
By the end of that first hunt together, I had decided that I owed Dwight a nicer knife. Yadda yadda yadda, and I get a nice new Buck Special with the fancy wooden handle delivered to him down in Texas a couple of weeks after the hunt.
Fast forward to 2015. The old Buck has been passed down to one of Keegan's brothers and Dwight is, as has been usual since 2013, carrying his new Buck that I got him. Now Dwight has been fighting a bum ankle for a while and has taken to using a mountain bike to get around a bit better in the high country. Because I am lazy, I was hanging back with him and keeping him company and such and just having the best hunt, you know? He's got an old Savage 99 in 300 Savage and iron sights, just a great rifle. Anyway, we get back to the cabin at the end of the first day and Dwight starts fixing chow. He reaches down to check or grab his knife or whatever and it is gone. Gone baby gone.
So the hunt is on. Check the truck, but it's already gathering dark outside so we can't do much and I can tell that it is bothering Dwight a lot that he had lost that Buck. Now, I felt like the chances were pretty good that we could find it, but we went ahead and we all said a prayer that we could have a little help to find that knife.
The next morning, I wasn't hunting elk, I was hunting that knife. I don't know how long it took exactly but it was before lunch and I saw something glistening on the trail. You gotta be freakin' kiddin' me. Only I didn't say freakin'...
There it was. Just laying there waiting for me to find it. So like a complete dick I grabbed it up and hid it until Dwight was coming along on his bike. There I was, just sitting like a lazy ass (Dwight hates a lazy ass).
What are you doin'? Oh, just sitting here trying to figure out who dropped this sweet looking knife!
No elk for me that year, but a successful hunt nevertheless!
I have a story about an old Buck Special (model 119, I think?) that I want to get recorded.
Rockon75
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