With the benefit of age, I have come to believe that the drive required for bagging a limit of any kind of game is directly proportional to one's age for the majority of us. As a young man I expended a lot of time and energy while making every effort to bag "my" limit, or at least be "Top Gun" for the day. Nowadays I seem to have less time for some reason; but also, now being on the back side of 55, I don't have the same energy levels and drive either! Now if I were hunting for subsistence, things would be much different of course; but, as someone who has shot his share of limits and is now approaching the autumn years of his life (what a pathetic thought!), I find my greatest pleasures afield come from the friendship of my companions, watching a good dog work or a puppy grow up, watching the enthusiasm of kids just developing their shooting and hunting skills, admiring and fondling a fine double shotgun, and just being out in the great and wonderful outdoors. If my game bag is a little lighter, and my gun a little heavier than it used to be; so what, I am not the least bit discouraged. The scriptures advise us, as we go thru the daily grid of life, to pause long enough to smell the roses, something in my youthful haste I had little time for; but thankfully, I have now lived long enough to understand and appreciate this great advice.
