Well, having begun a "Spring cleaning" ritual in the Piercey household over the past month, I find myself reviewing much of my kit, and it's space storage requirements in a house that I share with the Missus, my son, and two dogs. We all are guilty of the same thing. We take up a hobby, and as we progress, we accumulate, we upgrade, we accumulate.....
You start out, and you look at catalogs, websites, advertising, many tout the latest camo pattern, the latest technology in scent control, the latest, the best.....
Much of it actually does what it says. The advancements in garments alone have made it possible that you can, in fact, stand in a -30 blizzard, holding a gun, waist deep in 0 Deg water, and feel relatively comfortable. Gone are the days of a pair of gum rubber hip waders ( Jesus boots to my NL relatives), now you have space age gore tex uppers, mated to super insulated neoprene.......all of which works, until you walk through a hawthorne thicket to get to your favourite duck blind. ( At which point the stouter Jesus boots have a certain appeal, since a warrantee doesn't do you much good when your right legs soaked to the crotch, and the Cabelas is an hour away).
Stuff....
Guns and hardware are no different. Oh, I have fallen prey to some of the more salacious articles on super fast calibers, or the newest most up to date shotguns, with less felt recoil, and let's not forget optics. I have had virtually a small arsenal come through my safes ( yes, plural), and yet, those that remain, don't get traded or sold. I once had an affinity for full Mannlicher stocked rifles, and have had a couple of them, yet when going afield what came out to play? The same stainless, plastic stocked bolt gun that I always go with. Accurate as heck, and will do as a boat paddle in a pinch. The other rifles were far too pretty to take out in the field in less than perfect conditions.
As one moves towards mastery of their craft ( I say this in the abstract, as I am not close to being a master), one tends to review what they have, and what they use, and they then begin the great "paring down"
We look at the vast number of guns, and perhaps realize that quantity is no substitute for quality. We begin identifying those that are most useful, or indeed are the best to use for the job, and we divest ourselves of those which are not. We realize that one garment, which is multi purpose, may be better than a cabinet full of "specialty" gear. ( The popularity of the Mackinaw Cruiser Coat) is testament to this.
We look at the array of calls we have on our waterfowl lanyard, and realize that perhaps only the 3 calls got used last season, so perhaps we pass the other 6 on to new hunters who are beginning their "accumulation" phase. The same is said for guns, because just as we realize that the same O/U shotgun gets taken out every time we hunt upland, we perhaps pass some of the other semis, and pumps on, as there are newer hunters out there who want the fastest, and the best.
Not everyone comes to this phase in the same way, some never get there, and sadly spin in their graves as their widows and families sell off their much coveted treasures for a fraction of what was paid. ( An age old joke, whos humour is in it's truth).
At the end of the day, the best feeling is that of a good pair of boots, a good dog, a warm coat, and a good gun to walk the woods with. Everything else is superfluous.
I find myself mid-way through some of it, but I have an excuse. I have an eight year old boy, who before too long, may want to take up some of the hobbies I have laid the ground work for.....hunting, he's covered in spades, snowboarding, fishing, football, ditto. I gave up golf 7 years ago, but if he wants to take it up....there's a set of Callaways in the shed with his name on them.......just in case.
Enough reading....Go shooting
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