You've Got It All Wrong

Last Christmas I made this.

Outside snow was falling to the tune of Vince Guaraldi's Charlie Brown's Christmas and I sat nested in brown paper, masking tape and glue.
Hours later I hatched my deer.


But last weekend I learned that I got it all wrong.

First, a little background.
After living in Missoula for nearly two years now (relocating from Providence, RI) I've come to realize wildlife mounts are everywhere. They watch, glassy-eyed from barroom walls; en masse like simulated herds in sporting good stores,; in truck stops from vantages next to coolers of cheap beer; from within plastic vitrines at the post office; and atop fireplace mantles. Equally ubiquitous, taxidermy shops are spotted like wildlife themselves along roadsides, rooftops emblazoned with white hand-painted letters advertising the trade.

Montana after all, represents the remaining frontier and with it a way of life that embodies self-reliance and self-sufficiency. Here, for example, cast iron pans are well-seasoned, canning jars are sold in flats, and people bake pies from scratch. Gathering from the land begins in late spring as the mountains thaw and the previous year's burn sites are scoured for precious morels. Berries follow in summer and families return to coveted huckleberry patches with the hopes of collecting enough berries for a pie. Raspberries grow wild and take over yards. Bitter chokecherries come in late summer and are harvested, juiced, and sweetened to make wine. Often the first year's snow marks the end of autumn and the beginning of hunting season.

Curious to learn more about hunting after helping a neighbor butcher his kill, I registered for a free hunter's education course offered by the state's Fish Wildlife and Parks — a requirement for kids aged thirteen and up interested in obtaining a hunting license. The class was informative and gave me an opportunity to poll several hunters who attended the class with their spawn. I asked for their primary reasons for hunting and most listed these in the following order 1) to provide meat for their families 2) for sport 3) tradition. My informal poll also revealed to me my ignorance of hunting as a cultural tradition and that most hunters understand that hunting is a privilege and not a right.

Keeping taxidermists in business, some hunters have their best examples mounted as trophies, the distant cousins of the marble based, chromed plastic 'Honorable Mentions' of my suburban childhood. My 8 year-old mind tells me this act of preservation is weird, creepy, morbid and totally cool. My art school mind says stuffing a dead animal sans body and making it appear life-like is rad; so ironic. Hence, my Christmas papier mache foray: I figured what better way to tap into my machismo hunter self than to use paper and paste. My minds aside, what I find so refreshing (and here's where I go wrong) is that Montanans appreciate wildlife mounts without a shred of irony. Hunters are proud of their s/kills, appreciate their beauty, and display them by attempting to deny decay.
Huh.


See, totally wrong.
It's funny, just when you think you know something you realize that you don't know it at all.

(Next post: this fellow's home, Elkhorn Hot Springs)