I was pretty dazed and confused. Both my hearing and vision went for a few seconds, and slowly faded back to me. When I could finally start to figure out what just happened, my guide had already taken the shotgun from me, and was down by the bird. The tom turkey was flapping around, but he was dead. 

I tried to stand up so I could go over there and wrestle my turkey to the ground, but I immediately fell over. I was sitting on my left foot the entire time, and I had been sitting there while my guide communicated with the turkey for a good hour before I finally had a successful shot. So, while Tom continued to try and grab my turkey, I scooted over to a tree and starting to beat the hell out of my left foot against it. I figured that if I could just gain a little bit of feeling into my foot, then I could limp down to my bird and carry it over to my grandparents'. My foot started to hurt pretty badly, but I was relieved that I at least had some sort of feeling, got up, and limped down to my turkey. 

The tom turkey had come to rest on his back in some brambles. My guide congratulated me and instructed me to reach down and pick the bird up by his legs, which were sticking straight up towards the sky. I did, and I was honestly amazed by how much that tom weighed! I then threw it over my shoulder, and followed Tom back down the mountain, across the floodplain, and right over to my grandparents, who had heard the shot and seen everything unfold, and were already ready and waiting outside of their SUV. 

Once there, we worked on filling out and signing the tag, taking pictures, and telling the story of the two failed shots. Tom pulled out the round that didn't fire, and it was damaged. The firing pin had made its mark on the round the first time, but didn't have enough power to actually cause the round to explode. So, when I loaded the shotgun with the same round the second time, the firing pin hit the round, but it wasn't able to trigger an explosion because the primer was already dented. The third time, a new round was loaded into the shotgun correctly, and the primer wasn't dented before the firing pin struck it with enough force to fire the shotgun.  

It was a miracle that tom turkey stayed around, even throughout all of that! In pretty much every other case, the turkey would've been long gone before I even had a chance to load the shotgun a second time. Maybe the bird had some instinct issues. Maybe he was just desperate and stupid. I'm willing to bet on the latter, because the tom was alone, older, and clearly looking for a mate. He thought he had scored two desperate hens, when in fact we were just fooling him. 

Whatever the reason though, I was just relieved that I reached my ultimate goal, which was to get a tom turkey. However, I must admit, shooting the tom wouldn't make it to a top ten list of highlights from the whole experience if I made one. Being out in the wilderness, participating in nature like our ancestors have been doing for millions of years was what I'll ultimately remember. Nature is not a spectator sport. In order to get the full experience of nature and the woods, and help out nature the most, you have to be a participant, no matter how strange that sounds. 

And, also, there is a level of sadness that comes with watching an animal die, especially when you're the one ultimately calling the shots. It's not sadness that comes from a place of remorse. It's just the sting of death that brings a tinge of sadness, but the joy of the whole experience, topped with the satisfaction of filling out the tag and bringing home meat for the freezer, ultimately over-rides that sadness. It's still never easy to pull the trigger, but as hunters, we know it's our duty to do so.