Fred leaves to go to work at around five...which is about the time I get up. I have a cup of coffee or two and then I call Jake to wake him up for school. This morning the phone rang until I thought for sure he must have had the ringer turned off. Finally he picked up.
"Yeah?"
He sounded awful.
"Whatsa matter? You sick?"
"No...I'm tired."
"Tired!? Didn't you sleep?"
"Not as much as I would have liked to."
"Why not?"
"I was up half the night cleaning hogs." Yawn. "I shot two last night about ten o'clock."
"Jake! You ought to know better than that on a school night. What would possess you to shoot two hogs when you know you have to get up early in the morning?"
"It was an accident. I didn't mean to."
I laughed.
"Okay Jake. You accidently shot two hogs. Kinda like you accidently ate all the rest of the cake."
"No...no. I meant to to shoot the one, it was the other one I wasn't planning on."
"Okay, boy...'splain."
"Well, the dogs were barking so I went out there to check, and there were two little boars about eighty or ninety pounds trying to get to the feeder through the fence. I ran in the house and got the 30-30. I figured I would get one to put in the freezer. I got within about forty yards and shot, and it dropped right where it was standing."
This didn't surprise me. I know of only a few instances where he's shot at something, even on the run, and missed.
"And the other hog?"
"Well, it ran off."
"So...you, what...accidently shot it in the butt?"
"NO!"
I waited.
"It only ran off about twenty yards, and then it fell down."
I knew what was coming, but I had to tease him anyway.
"Oh I get it. The sound of the shot scared it so bad that it had a heart attack."
"No." (yawning laugh) "The bullet hit the one hog in the neck and then passed through and hit the other one in almost the same spot. They were about the same size, and standing side by side. I was close enough I guess, that the bullet was going fast enough to punch a hole in both of them. Believe me, I wasn't wanting to clean two hogs. It just worked out that way."
I just sat there trying to picture the whole thing in mind.
"You're a mess, you know that?" I said.
"That's what I hear."
"You going to school?"
"I was planning on it," I could hear the sound of a stretch in his voice, and he sighed, "but I feel like one big knot...I swear I could stretch a mile if I didn't think I'd have to walk back."
I laughed. He had used one of my favorite expressions.
"Well, look at it this way. If you go, you can brag to all your friends about how you took out two hogs with one bullet."
"They'll just call me a liar."
"Let 'em. You know the truth. Now, get ready for school."
"Okay."
"I love you, son."
"You too." Another yawn, and then the phone clicked in my ear.
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