Turkey Hunting...and cleaning

 A few weeks ago Lige was finally able to go turkey hunting again.  It's a hobby he picked up several years ago, but he hasn't had time or opportunity to indulge in it for quite a while.  So when an opportunity popped up with a former co-worker, he set off with my blessing.

A successful hunt means 2 things...1. Yummy turkey  and 2.  Cleaning them.  You can't get to number one without number two, so Lige pushed up his sleeves and got to it.  We (And I mean Lige) gutted them.  We decided to pluck some and skin the rest to make it easier.  Why didn't we skin them all?  Because we are borrowing my parents' turkey fryer.  Look again to number one...yum yum!  Once the skinning was done, we (and this time I actually mean WE) plucked the others.  It was a time-consuming process, I must say.  I just kept thinking about how delicious they were going to be.  That helped.  :)

It is grueling work: gutting, cleaning and plucking.  Lige and I have both cleaned fish before, but this was different.  Lige's dad doesn't eat much meat anymore, after years and years of butchering and cleaning animals.  I can finally understand a little better why.  There is something intimate and sobering about this whole process.  It's one thing to shoot an animal many yards away.  It's another to clean out everything that made that creature alive.  As we were plucking side by side, Lige and I talked with renewed appreciation of the Native Americans and how they understood the sacrifice involved and utilized as much of an animal's body as they could. 

Wow, I didn't know this post was gonna take this kind of turn!  I will close with this:  We are thankful for meat. (Number one above-yum!)  We are thankful for cold winter days out in nature.  We are thankful for our right to hunt and the responsibility that comes with it.  

We thank God for all of this.