Scent Memories

Sights, sounds, and smells can trigger old memories in all of us and last night I had a scent that took me back to an unknown place and time. It was more of a feeling and a memory that it was, somehow, related to a new knife.

As I was making my rounds through the house before bed I caught a whiff of something outside that caused my brain to run at 100 miles per hour. "I've smelled that before," I thought. It was kind of a musky, sour smell that I knew meant an animal was running around just outside the open window.

But what could it be?

I tried to remember why the smell reminded me of a new knife but just couldn't place it.

Finally, as I slept, the answer came to me. The smell was that of a raccoon. It was such a deeply ingrained scent in my memory because it was partly, if not wholly, responsible for my progression down the path of hunting and trapping. After having a large family of raccoons move in under my house I made several phone calls for help but all the animal control people wanted so much money and the Village told me that I needed a licensed trapper to remove the animals.

Then I called the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) and asked them how I could go about becoming a trapper. "Send in an application and $9," was the response. I made sure there wasn't a class requirement (like Hunter Safety for new hunters) and they assured me that was all the more complicated the process was.

I sent off my application plus $9 and, in a few weeks, I was a fully licensed trapper in the state of Illinois.

Then I had to remove 10 raccoons from under the house and that smell will stick with me forever--even if not in the front of my mind.

Thanks for reading,


B