“Sight In Day”, A Mini Vacation: Part 3

After a short wait, my turn comes up but I’ve got the human equivalent of buck fever. I can stay cool as a cucumber when the hunt is on, but I’m jittery in front of a crowd.

I’m no longer used to ranges. I feel like everyone is judging me. I hunt alone (or occasionally with Dr. Mingo) and haven’t been seriously into marksmanship for a while. At least in this phase of my life, shooting in front of a crowd is weird. They’re watching! What if I look like an idiot? Will I have to deal with the “target of shame”?

They’ve got a bench vice, which I’m not used to using. And a bench, which is also something I don’t use. And there are six people lined up behind me; two Greybeards with something they got from the time of John Wayne, a woman who is precisely hot enough to distract me, and three dude bros with tacti-cool ARs that can probably boot an iPhone.

I drank a whole thermos of coffee driving here and my heart rate is up. Shit! Stage fright.

OK, breathe. Chill, remember all the shit you know. You ought to have been keeping up your skills. Dumbass…

“Lane six, is everything ok?”

“Yeah, just getting settled.”

“OK then, you’re on target four.”

Eventually I shove the sled aside. Too much crap to think about. I grab a small sandbag but it’s too short. I whip off my hat and cram it under the stock. (Is that not what hats are for?) That’s good.

The bench seat is giving me a wedgie…

“Lane six, you need anything?”

“Nope, thanks. “

Click.

Fuck, I forgot to load. Well at least I’m not flinching. Meanwhile, folks on the left of me and the right have come up, verified they can get “minute of deer”, and left. It’s like taking a leak in a crowded stadium where there are a dozen urinals and hundred people crowding them. I’d rather piss on a stump in the lonely wilderness…

Is that dude chuckling about me? Bastard!

Let it go. Breathe, don’t itch your nose, relax. Squeeze.

BAM.

I didn’t see the hit. Meh, it didn’t feel all that bad. Probably not embarrassing.

“Bullseye!”

What? I gotta’ verify that. “You’re sure?”

“Yep, nice. Can’t you see it?”

I eye the scope and find the hole. Damn! Very nice! “Can I shoot a few more?”

“Of course, but it’s only downhill from here.”

It seems to me that a bullseye could be luck. I don’t trust luck. The next shot is 2” high, which takes the shine off my bullseye. The next four are clustered very precisely at 1” high and all are +/- half an inch or less from center line.

In retrospect, I think I sighted this particular rifle 1” high at 100 yards with 150 grain bullets on the logic that I might take a longer shot. (I should write that down.) Thus, the first shot really was “luck”. I pulled it 1” low from point of aim. Not that I’m telling anyone that!

I’d like to dial the scope down 1”. Then again, this isn’t “uptight marksman sight in day”. I’m slowing up the works.

The spotter is enthused. He has little marks on a dry erase board/target to mimic the target out there. “If you drop that flier”, he points at the one 2” high, “you’ve got a group of just over 1-inch.” He’s beaming.

I’m pleased but a student of science. You don’t get to “drop” a “flier” any more than an elk gets a Mulligan if I put a hollow point into its chest. Hunting is for keeps. You get what you got.

Then again, it’s plenty good enough. “Ah heck, I deserve that ‘flier’. But I’ll take 2-inch groups too. It’ll work.” The spotter nods. Meanwhile, my mind is racing. The first shot was low and the second high, but the last four were very good. I wish I’d been practicing all summer. I could tighten that group. I have to force myself not to go down the rabbit hole of super precision. Everyone else is getting much larger groups and firing much fewer shots. I shrug. How big is a deer’s heart, or an elk? Gotta’ be bigger than 2”. It’s good enough.

“Thanks, guys.” I grab my shit and go.

Driving home I ponder the significance of 2” versus a likely quite obtainable 1”. I’ll probably never take a shot where 2 MOA wasn’t plenty good enough.

Last year I faced that very concept. I had a chance to thread a bullet through brush to drop a small doe. It was pretty close but I had only a 4” circle to shoot through. I’m 99% sure I could have made the shot but, like I said, I’m a wuss about tracking. I aimed at a larger opening two feet ahead and prayed the deer would step forward. It did, briefly. I had a split second to shoot but I was already aimed and waiting. I felt the risk of waiting for the deer to step was worth it. YMMV.

Well that’s the story of site in day. It’s likely something most of you do every year too. But I thought I’d describe it for non-hunters.

A.C.

P.S. If you’re a non-hunter, my description of the terminal ballistics on big game can sound a bit harsh. Sorry, but it is what it is. Wondering about organ placement and bullet accuracy is a messy unforgiving business but that’s my natural approach. To me, it’s unavoidable. I dutifully master the messy realities of logistics and effective killing and earn the beautiful cyclic oneness of hunting as reward. You don’t get one without the other.