The Empty Chair

[Flint50]

This year at deer camp there will be an empty chair. The chair will be left empty on purpose.
The original occupant of the chair was my Dad. He died of cancer last year, right at deer season.
Gone is a soul of unrelenting optomism. Gone is a soul of adventure regardless of circumstance.Gone is someone who's knowledge of the woods was unequaled, and someone who was glad to share what he had learnrd. Gone is someone who's laughter would shake the mountains, and who's snoring would bring them down. Gone is my best friend.
So at deer camp this year, there will be an empty chair. But I know it really wont be empty, he will be setting there. and it will echo the stories and words of wisdom, the laughter just like before........

Sorry guys, right now I'm really missing my Dad.

 

[rmcmaster]

I know the feeling Flint. Lost my Dad in February. I'll head out the door without him for the first time in 33 years. Not sure how you can look forward to opening day and not look forward to it at the same time. He wasn't just my Dad, he was a friend and travelling buddy.
Don't be sorry. Be sorry for the person that doesn't have these feelings or memories.

 

[roundball]

I know the feeling Flint. Lost my Dad in February. I'll head out the door without him for the first time in 33 years. Not sure how you can look forward to opening day and not look forward to it at the same time. He wasn't just my Dad, he was a friend and travelling buddy.
Don't be sorry. Be sorry for the person that doesn't have these feelings or memories.

Lost mine at age 7...can barely even remember him...I envey the relationships described here...

 

[Maynerd62411]

My Dad died almost 12 years ago, now. He died on June 4th and his birthday is June 30th. That whole month, no matter how I try not to, he's always on my mind.
I never got a chance to hunt with my Dad. He was always in poor health when I was growing up. I envy my older brothers for that.

 

I think i have stated this before , I do not believe they are ever gone but instead just out of sight . I lost my father back in 91 from Colin cancer . I have one day a year where I just go and sit in a place he and my grandfather would always spend opening day ,that day is our day . On that morning we smoke , talk and watch the day go by .
This may sound off but I tell you in times like those you are going through now ,,, if you remember something and smile while asking them if they remember you can almost here a reply .
This is a thing of the hart , a feeling that comes from your soul, you feel the reply more the hear it .

 

[vradin]

The chair may be empty, but your heart will be full. There are those years of memories, that do not leave. There is the knowledge and skills still to be passed along to another generation. So long as you keep telling the old stories, passing along those skills, you learn to live with a full heart despite an empty chair.

I know. My pop died when my son, his first grandson, was only 5 months old. My son never got a chance to know him, but the skills and knowledge has been passed on anyway. I see it in my son's hands when he holds pop's tools.

There isn't a day goes by that I don't miss the old man, and it's been almost 18 years.

Wish I could tell you that it gets easier, but it don't. It just doesn't hurt so bad for so long.

vic

 

:m2c:
16 years ago , on my 40th birthday , my hunting partner, my Dad,passed away. He was a guide , woodsman and some would say could catch a feed of trout in a rainbucket.
From the time I was 7 he dragged me through the woods , always explaining and pointing out the whys and wherefores.
I think he was born 100 years too late , he would have loved this game.
Never left home except for a government vacation in Europe from 1940-1945 , left a big chunk of himself including a kidney to a German grenade in a roadway in Holland .
After he passed , I never hunted again. Couldn't find another partner ,or at least one who would put up with me. But I never lost the love of the woods and the camps.
So I did discover this great hobby of ours. I think it was his way of making sure I still roamed the woods , and enjoyed good friends and great times.
Not a trip to the range goes by I don't think of and talk to him. Crazy, I don't think so . Nor do I really care , he is there to laugh at my blown shots and steady my hand for the good ones.
Never be afraid to own up to these feelings . They are what make us human.
Above the obivious benefits of this Forum is the ability for a bunch of grown men and women to make these comments and have others know just how we feel and what we mean.
May it never end. :imo:

 

[shmrck1]

Flint50,
although my dad passed 11 years ago i still
cannot go into the woods without thinking of him, and
to tell you the truth i hope i never do. you see he was
more than my dad, he was my friend and mentor. he did'nt
teach me everything i know about the outdoors but he
never quit trying to. hopefully we learned from each other,and sorry to say he learned stupidity from me and
i learned wisdom,love & humility from him.
if there is a heaven(and i'm sure there is) it
will be a place where you most want to be and that to
me will in the woods with my dad.
i just hope that when i go to the woods with
my dad that my son is able to say the same things
about me that have been said here about our dads.
when you stop and think about it our children
are our epitaph as their children will be to them.
snake-eyes :hmm: eace: :thumbsup:

 

[Pork Chop]

My father passed on the day I was supposed to walk down the aisle for College graduation. It also happened to be Father's day. I am thankful that he saw me get commissioned (he actually pinned on the bar) as I was the first in a long military family line to become an officer. He was quite proud of me for that, and it brought me closer to him after years of a rough relationship. I remember hunting with Dad as a kid and those were good times. Bittersweet stuff...

 

[bob1961]

I

 

[hobbles]

I have 4 kids and 1 grand daughter and would not want them to go through what I have gone through...

Very good sir,,,

 

[amccall]

I know the feeling. This Oct. will be two years for me. The one thing that gives me strength is my faith. Knowing that one day the empty chair will be filled again but not by my Dad but by me. My prayers are with you all. eace:

 

[Stumpkiller]

My Dad passed away in 1996 at age 84, after a series of strokes over two years. Lost his sight, speech, facilities, paralized in stages.

That was just a few weeks before opening day. I went out on the opener. Had a buck walk up at first light and I just let him mill around me until he wandered off. At one point he was within 15 feet. I couldn't bring myself to kill him. Left for home, cleaned the gun and didn't go out again that year.

My Dad never hunted, but I just didn't have it in me that year.

A fellow retired and bought up a woodlot and built a house right where I entered the woods for years in my favorite spot. Turned out he had emphisemia and had loved to hunt, but couldn't get out much then. He insisted I park in his driveway, so I could stop in for coffee after on my way out and give a report of what I'd seen. For 15 seasons there was a light on and a silhouette in the doorway if I was a bit late getting back to my car. I still stop and visit with him, in the woods behind his house where his ashes are spread, near a little creek with a handy stump to sit at. His son & daughter-in-law now live in the house, taking care of his widow who is battling cancer. Now when I visit there is a little bright-eyed, blonde girl who has to give me full reports of the deer she's seen.

The wheel turns.

 

[Bob J]

Bob and Flint and all of you muzzleloading brothers; I know how you feel. My Dad died from melanoma cancer 5 years ago. He took my brothers and I to the woods since we were toddlers. Gave me my first gun, a 28 ga. Belgian double hammergun I still have. My first ML too. And countless hours fishing and hunting (and exploring for Indian artifacts). He left us 150 acres of N. Fla. hardwoods with a 12' x 16" shed (we call our "Cabin"). Inside his hunting shirt still hangs on the wall where he left it. But more importantly, the good memories of times we shared and the lessons he taught us: Be a sportsman, don't gangbang the wildlife, don't wound game, don't indiscriminanetly clear the land - PRESERVE it. PROTECT it. My mother took her life last year after years of battling depression. I don't know why God didn't cure her. His ways are higher than ours. And I know they are both with Him, in a far better place. As with Dad, we have the good memories and the good lessons taught..
Take care, and God bless,
Bob J.

 

[76monza]

July 1st, 2003 only 6 days before his 80th birthday my father passed away from lung cancer. Though I didn't have the experience of hunting trips with my dad as my older brothers did, I guess he just lost interest in that by the time I was old enough to be interested in hunting. Never the less, he did take me with him when we went to sales, auctions and the usual rounds of his friends and aquaintences in the antique world. We took many trips when I was younger artifact hunting, Scout camps and fishing. Fishing, something he truly loved up until that last year. Now as I set at my desk, I can look around at all the reminders of my father. from the books that passed from his collection to mine, the artifacts we collected when I was a kid, the guns that he gave me that reside in my closet, the pipes he used to smoke his framed campaign map and medals to the colors that draped his casket the day he was buried. Although these are small physical reminders of my Dad, my memories of him mean so much more to me.

smokeydays

 

[wil]

I'm glade to say that my woods mentor, my hunting and fishing partner, and my gold prospecting buddy, my Dad, is still with me. And after reading all these other post I think I'll give him a call.
Wil

 

[hobbles]

good idea,, and tell him WE ALL said HI,,

 

[merdean]

My Father passed away two years ago last month. Because of my military career, I did not get to spend as much time with him as my brother and sister. I am the black sheep of the family, never living "close to home". The first time I went hunting after he passed I was looking through the sights as a squirrel high up in a Ponderosa Pine. The wind was just stirring the branches up enough to make them move. I could hear my father's voice on the wind saying "Steady, son, steady. Wait....squeeeeeeze that trigger gently, gently. GOOD SHOT!!!!" No one else could hear him. But with his help, I filled my bag that day. He has been with me on every hunting trip since. I now wait for the day that I can truly shoot along side him again.

 

[The Kansan]

Lost my dad 4 years ago yesterday to Alzheimers. Lucked out and got a load that took me past Mom's house, so got to eat supper and visit with her a while last night. I think it helped both of us quite a bit.

Kinda' funny ya' know? It took me a long time to go from thinking I was never gonna' be able to hunt or fish with Pop again to realizing that I was never gonna' have to hunt or fish without him again. Every step I take through the woods or along the creek, he's there... Thanks Pop!

...The Kansan...

 

[Flint50]

Thanks to all my muzzleloading brothers for their personal stories.Nice to know I am not alone here...
There MUST be a great beyond to go hunting with our Dads again. ( I truly believe that) Thanks for sharing your stories.
To those who are lucky enough to still have their Dad, Mom around-GIVE THEM A CALL-TAKE THEM HUNTING/FISHING/OUT TO DINNER--anything to show you love them-Flint50