I

n our family, Illinois shotgun season is not just a date on the calendar. It is a tradition, a holiday, and the kind of event you count down to all year. While other families plan vacations, we plan stand locations, check wind directions, and lay out blaze orange and camouflage like it is our Sunday best.

The weather never cooperates. It never has. Cold. Rain. Wind. It doesn’t matter. We go anyway. We always will.

This story actually began weeks before the season opened.

By mid-October, harvest was wrapping up, and the land was showing it. The fields were dry, cracked, and tired. It was the kind of dry that makes you pay attention to the small things, especially water.

Wade noticed it first, like he usually does.

He found a spot where deer were slipping through, drawn to what little water remained. Standing there and studying the area, he was already imagining how deer would move through it.

“This is it,” he said. “Every deer around here is going to come through.”

His dad didn’t agree. Not even a little.

“Bad spot,” he said. “Wrong setup.”

But Wade saw something in it.

I’ve never been one to turn down helping when it comes to hunting, so I did what I do best. I pushed. I convinced. Before long, all three of us were standing in that patch of timber arguing about trees, angles, and shooting lanes.

We complained. We swatted mosquitoes. We second-guessed everything.

In the end, they picked the tree I wanted.

I won.

It was hot and miserable, not exactly the picture people paint of hunting season, but we got it done. A stand now hung in a place that didn’t make sense to everyone, but meant something to Wade.

There was still trimming to do, but harvest has a way of stealing time from everything else.

Next came the camera.

Nothing fancy. Just an SD card and a little patience.

Then, on October 18, everything changed.

He showed up.

A drop tine buck.

A brute.

The kind of deer hunters spend a lifetime hoping to see, let alone harvest. Heavy, unique, and unmistakable.

And there he was, standing exactly where Wade believed he would be.

Then he disappeared.

For thirty-three days, there were no pictures, no sightings, and no sign of him at all. Not even during the rut. It was as if he had vanished into the timber and taken the dream with him.

Maybe he knew.

Maybe he felt the pressure.

Maybe something just wasn’t right.

Opening day arrived with steady rain and a wind that made that stand unusable. Wade hunted elsewhere.

But Saturday felt different.

The wind was finally right, southwest and perfect for that stand.

Before daylight, Wade eased across the chisel field, scanning through the gray morning. At a distance he caught sight of a shape.

Big.

Quiet.

Watching.

Was it him?

Did I just bust him?

Every step after that carried doubt.

When he reached the stand, he decided to pull the card from the camera.

That decision changed everything.

Scrolling through the photos, he stopped.

There he was.

Alive.

Two days earlier.

After thirty-three days of nothing, the ghost was suddenly real again.

In that moment, hope came rushing back. The kind of excitement only hunters understand. The kind that makes every early morning, every mosquito, and every long sit worth it.

But shotgun season rarely makes anything easy.

Deer are pushed. Patterns change. The woods fill with orange, noise, and pressure.

Wade sat. He prayed. He passed deer. He watched others slip through. He planned to sit all day, but hunger finally got him down. A quick break. A bite to eat. Then right back in.

A cold front was coming. The wind would shift soon. Time was running out.

The woods came alive that afternoon. Deer moved everywhere.

But not him.

Then something shifted in a thicket.

A movement.

Subtle.

Different.

His heart knew before his mind could catch up.

It is him.

A quiet prayer left his lips.

Please let it be him.

Then it happened fast. Too fast to think.

The gun came up. The shot broke. The deer flinched.

Hit.

A second shot followed, just to be sure.

Then silence.

And then the nerves came.

Hard. Fast. Uncontrollable.

My phone rang in the middle of a Notre Dame game. I saw Wade’s name, and I already knew.

“I got him,” he whispered. “I got him, Mom. I got him.”

“Are you sure?” I asked. “Have you touched him yet?”

“Not yet.”

“Do not push him. Give him time. Be careful.”

Every second felt longer than it should.

I was not there, and that part was hard. I wanted to walk that trail. I wanted to see it unfold. But I knew his dad and brother were on their way.

Because that is what we do.

We show up for each other.

It did not take long before the picture came through.

And there he was.

Drop tine.

Real.

Tangible.

No longer a ghost.

I sat staring at that photo, overwhelmed in the best way.

“I am proud of you,” I told him. “I cannot wait to hear it all.”

The woods have always given something back to us.

Not always a deer.

Not always success.

But something deeper.

Time together.

Stories.

Moments that stay.

My dad once told me how special it was that we do this as a family. That we show up. Support each other. We celebrate together.

The older I get, the more I understand what he meant.

The deer are wonderful.

The turkey hunts are exciting.

The success is fun.

But that is not what lasts.

What lasts are the mornings spent together before daylight.

The laughter.

The stories.

The traditions passed from one generation to the next.

Some families take vacations.