I decided to work with my dad because my creative writing teacher asked about a hunting experience I had and I just thought about doing some kind of story about me going hunting with my family. I wrote a little paragraph, and my dad wrote a couple sentences about my great grandfather’s experience and thought process about it. I think writing this intergenerational story really made my dad think and remember how good and fun hunting is.

In writing about this hunting trip, we thought about writing about how it was my first hunting trip, it’s a family tradition, and even how my dad still feels about it all these years later. We wrote about how it makes us as a family feel, the smell, the feeling of the nice cold air. Me and my dad working on this together made us realize again how good of a feeling it is to do this.

This year was my first year hunting. I had just turned ten. We hunt in Jump River, but that wasn’t my first time there. My dad and my grandpa had been hunting there for over 35 years. They put a camper there and installed a gas heater and a wood heater inside. In more recent years I have used  wood heaters because of how expensive gas is. The smell of being up there is just so crisp. Like the forest and the cold air. Getting into our hunting shack for the first time before we get the heat going is a feeling that makes me smile everytime. 

My father said this, “A family tradition that goes back at least 75 years. Fellowship and fresh air are the key to a successful hunt. Bringing food home is an extra. Those are your great grandfather's words… not mine… not grandpa. That’s exactly how it’s always felt to me too.”

Hunting is something that brings our family together. We have our own, private land that we used to hunt on. There is also public land that we can hunt on. There is a south gate and a north gate. The closest actual town to us is called Hawkins. That’s where we go to make phone calls and get our groceries.