Clarence, Subcontracting and The Bionic Deer

The stories in this column are true. Averett lives a dull life in rural Southside Virginia with his wife Management, two children and a rotating assortment of goats, dogs, cats, snakes and other local fauna.

There is an old story about a woman in West Virginia who was seeing a man named Clarence.  After a few years he abandoned her with a child on the way and moved to Virginia. The woman’s brothers and father decided to go to Virginia and bring him back for a shotgun wedding. Just as they crossed the border and drove under a bridge the father shouted, “Stop the truck. We’re going home.  Did you see that sign on the bridge? It said Clarence 8 foot 6 inches.  We ain’t gonna be able to make him do nothing.”

The Clarence in the story isn’t my friend Clarence.  Our Clarence isn’t eight six and is too nice to have done such a thing.

Our Clarence comes down and shoots at the deer running around our property. This is good for both of us. He gives us deer meat and we give him a place to hunt. Then we discuss politics and all sorts of stuff and he goes back to the city for another week.

I hunted when I was younger but like many of my other youthful past-times I now subcontract out so I don’t have to do them. Clarence is contracted to do my hunting.  Another guy drinks beer for me. Another one is willing to handle any physical violence and I even have a guy subcontracted in case I get sent to jail. He will be serving my time for me but he doesn’t know it so don’t tell him.  I am even adding a subcontracted cusser.

So, in spite of the fact that both Management and I really like Clarence, the deer on our place must not.  They enjoy tormenting him.  Last week there were five deer in the yard while he was in the woods a few hundred yards away.

Yesterday Clarence was in the woods when I came home. Standing beside his truck was a deer.  At that point I realized that although he trusts me he might not trust me not to tease him and say I saw a deer when there wasn’t one.

We all know I would be capable of tying a deer hoof to a stick to make tracks or making a buck rub just to torment him.  That is what friends are for.  But would I really lie about seeing a deer?

This time I decided to use my phone and take a picture. Keeping in mind that my phone is so old it has Roman numerals on it I did my best and got a picture which I sent to his phone as he sat on his tree stand watching for deer.   

He messaged back “??.”  I responded, “Deer.” He responded, “That’s just not right.”  I don’t know if he meant me or the deer.

That was when I realized I had messed up.  I could have been doing this for years. There are dozens of nicely mounted trophy buck heads I can borrow and even a few full-body mounts.  I could have really messed with him.

If it weren’t for the time and effort required I would still do it but after confessing in advance he wouldn’t believe me.

Years ago I was in court for a speeding ticket and talking with another guy who had been charged with, in his words, “shooting the game warden’s bionic deer.”  According to him the VDGIF has a mechanical deer that they use to bait for road hunters.

Now every hunter knows it is illegal to bait for any game so it should be illegal for VDGIF to bait for hunters.

His story was that he saw a beautiful buck on the side of the road. “I got out and was watching it through the scope on my rifle. Not only was I not going to shoot it, I had decided it was the mechanical deer and there was a game warden watching.  THEN he twitched his tail and before I knew what happened my trigger finger took over and I shot.”

My case was called first and I didn’t wait to find out what happened.