Parcheesi

Before I begin my story, I need to get something out of the way.

 

Mom. Stop reading. There’s information here you shouldn’t have.

 

Just walk away.

 

Now that that is done, I can talk to you guys.

 

Seriously, Mom. Stop reading.

 

I’m pretty sure I misinterpreted a conversation. I’m also sure the point I was trying to make was moot. Poor Don was already aware of the point I was earnestly arguing. But I had to get it out there anyway.

 

Our conversation began late Tuesday night, well after a second glass of wine I never should have imbibed. We are headed to The Cabin, soon and often. Besides being a respite, we’re nearing small game season.

 

If you’re not a hunter, as statistics show 95% of you are not, you’re probably not so sure what “small game season” means. I passed hunter education, and I’m not so sure, either. But a solid piece I just edited says hunters should routinely take the time to familiarize themselves with hunting regulations, no matter their experience.

 

That made me feel better about my ignorance.

 

Consulting my trusty Pennsylvania Hunting & Trapping Digest – yes, that’s an actual publication – I see small game in Pennsylvania consists of squirrel, pheasant, rabbit, grouse,  bobwhite quail, woodchuck, crow, and snowshoe hare. Pheasant requires its own permit. I mean, obviously.

 

Before you ask, I’ve eaten three or four of those animals, and cooked one. And yes. We’ve served squirrel meat at parties.

 

 

Although by far, the thing that chagrined me the most was my daughter’s conversation with her technology teacher. He stopped me backstage at the school play to verify that she did, in fact, hunt squirrel with her dad.

 

I shared that story with the good folks over at Conserve The Wild. Somehow, I think they just didn’t appreciate the discomfort I felt in that moment. But then that kind of thing probably happens to them all the time.

 

If you haven’t noticed, I skipped right over hunting and eating crow. Let’s not talk about that. Ever.

 

 

Our Tuesday conversation began over the hunting pants Don bought me. To quote him, I can’t hunt in “leggings or whatever.” He hunts in what we call his Steve Rinella Butt Sassy Pants.

 

Rinella is a hunter, which for Don is everything but for me is mostly a side note. I love his writing, but if I start talking about writers this whole thing will turn into a lecture on the overlooked allegories in Christine and its similarities to Frankenstein.

 

Rinella wears these particular pants hunting, under his clothes as intended, as does Don. Neither Rinella’s preference for them nor their ability to insulate their owner is the best part.

 

That distinction belongs to the cut of the pants. They stop at mid-calf, like capris or clamdiggers. One day, after a morning of hunting, Don returned to The Cabin, stripping off his hunting pants as he arrived. He immediately headed to the fireplace, to stoke the flames and chase the chill from The Cabin.

 

As he bent over, our son noticed the cut of the pants, how they only covered about three-quarters of Don’s legs. My eyes were buried in a book, so I wasn’t gaping at the sight of my 6’2”, Abraham Lincoln-legged husband strutting around in hot pants.

 

But our son immediately burst out laughing, asking Don where he got those butt-sassy pants.

 

He was about ten or eleven at the time. I would have intervened, but Don has nobody to blame for that kid’s humor but himself. If that’s the DNA you’re going to send my way, I’m going to grow you a Mini-Me. Well, a Mini-Don.

 

So now they’re the Steve Rinella Butt Sassy pants. Thank you, First Lite, for the unintentional comedy.

 

Don, by the way, often devolves into a rant about the benefits of those pants whenever we call them Butt Sassy. He also likes to point out he had them before Rinella. Which honestly is just as funny.

 

Thank you again, First Lite.

 

 

So I have hunting pants, which are not leggings. And I think I have a rifle, or maybe I’m sharing one with the kids. And I think Don got me tags, which are things from the state saying what you can hunt. You pay for tags, and the money goes to parks and things like that.

 

That’s about the extent of my outdoors knowledge. I should know more, as a licensed hunter, outdoorsman’s wife, and lifetime member of BHA. But I’m not a very good wife, I have trouble learning unless I’m doing – hunter education is online – and sometimes Don tries to talk to me about this stuff while I’m watching The Office.

 

Please don’t talk to me while I’m watching The Office.

 

In our Tuesday night conversation, Don said he’d start me out with squirrel. Apparently, learning to hunt is a bit like entering the Marvel Cinematic Universe. You can’t start out hunting elk in the Bob Marshall Wilderness any more than you can start out with the MCU by watching Endgame.

 

So squirrel it is.

 

But if Don and I are out hunting squirrels, what do we do with the kids?

 

That’s when the confusion began.

 

Don said the kids could stay with his parents. He meant at The Cabin, but I thought he meant at home. In my defense, Don’s birthday is coming and his mom has offered to take the kids for the weekend so Don and I can get away.

 

Which reminds me. Mom – Tina Mom, not Biological Mom – you should stop reading right about here. Biological Mom, you should have stopped eight paragraphs ago.

 

Being alone at The Cabin begged the obvious question. Did he expect me to, um, play Parcheesi with him at The Cabin? Because if you guys know my Cabin rules, then Don should be well aware of my Cabin rules too.

 

Now Don, ever enterprising, suggested playing Parcheesi in a variety of ways. But let’s just say there’s no way to safely play Parcheesi when there are bugs on the floor, spiders on the walls, and occasionally a mouse living in your bunk.

 

Besides. I’m a rule-follower. There’s only one way to play Parcheesi, am I right guys?

 

We could use a sleeping bag for Parcheesi, Don suggested. I can’t tell you how many ways I’m not playing Parcheesi using a sleeping bag. Don thinks I don’t know where the sleeping bags are kept at The Cabin. But I do. On a shelf, just below the ceiling, in his room. Next to Pete’s bed.

 

Each time I take Pete’s bed down from that shelf I fully expect a mouse to be staring at me from behind the cushiony confines of Pete’s pallet. Or from inside the cushiony confines of Pete’s pallet.

 

Is there any way I’m getting inside – let alone playing Parcheesi – with anything that may have been exposed to mice and Pete’s Petey-ness? I don’t shower barefoot at The Cabin. I don’t walk around barefoot at The Cabin. I don’t even wear shorts at the Cabin. I’m not using a sleeping bag at The Cabin.

 

As I sputtered all of this at Don, he noted the pointless nature of our conversation. He also noted he was well aware of my Cabin rules. He also said he keeps the sleeping bags at our house, which I only sort of believe.

 

So the kids and his parents will hang at The Cabin. We will go hunt squirrel.

 

 

To quote Sha-Na-Na, I hate to leave you. But I really can’t stay. I need to review squirrel hunting techniques and regulations. I also need to watch some butchering videos. And find a squirrel recipe I’d like to try. And I need to find out which snakes are still active in Pennsylvania in the fall, so I know exactly what I need to be afraid of as I wander the woods.

 

And if you’re disturbed by the thought of squirrel hunting, I get it. Reach out. We can talk. I once felt the same way. Still do, when I have to explain it to the technology teacher while Belle sings about books on the other side of the curtain.

 

Now Biological Mom, I know you read this whole thing, even though I said you’re not allowed. So now I’m going to ask you to refrain from showing this to my father.

 

I do not want to discuss Parcheesi with my father.

 

Ever.