From Son To Father

As my father approached the end of his life we got to reminiscing. The place where I filmed this is the seat of this story. We belonged to the company's horse club and camped at Burning Bear quite often. It is inaccessible during the winter months. If you ever go there you will fully understand. My sister's oldest daughter was sitting next to the window with my father and someone had asked me a question about memories with him. I laughed and then told this story.
There was another family there that had brought their granddaughters from Texas with them on the campout. Myself, my sister and those two decided we'd campout and sleep under the stars next to the rather large campfire. Let me tell you those girls were gorgeous. My sister went to sleep pretty quick but the brunette and I were both smart asses and got on just fine. She leaned over and whispered in my ear. There was a man standing there drying his shirt over the fire. She said "I think something just fell out of his pocket and into the fire. Should we say something?" I told her. "No. Let's let it cook up for a minute or so first." She gave me a conspiratorial grin and nodded. A moment later I leaned over and whispered. "That's probably the worst idea I've ever had. It might be ammo or something." We both spoke up rather quickly and he tried to figure out what it might be." I was leaning into the fire looking for something out of place. Suddenly the man exclaimed. "It's a CO2 cartridge for my pellet pistol."
At this point I realize I'm someplace I shouldn't be. Boom! Something whizzed by my right ear and a large flaming log was launched onto my sisters sleeping bag. You know those stories of little old ladies picking up cars and dragging people out? True! A rather robust woman I mean really big and not athletic, jumped eight feet over the fire, grabbed my sisters sleeping bag off of the ground with her in it and shook the hell out of it, before tossing it on the grass five feet away. It was weird my sister woke up rather suddenly.

My two nieces were laughing their butts off and the oldest one said my father was too. It was an awesome memory and that particular place Burning Bear was where this and many other adventures occurred. A place of many good memories.

Now about the awesome drone footage. There's a story there too. I shot the part that went across the valley leaving the campground not twenty feet from where the above story took place first because things happen and I know the sequences usually before they do. There are risks when you're doing certain things. When I got to the part where I opened the whole thing I filmed the river sequence to a certain point. I was loving what I was capturing, but knew it had been a while since I'd flown in tight quarters so caution was a good idea. I was going to go for another sequence and started to bring the drone back down the river. I turned it around forgot and hit a branch two inches away from where it had been. It flipped and vanished into the water. I couldn't find it and went to get my dog out of the truck since I was going to be on the other side of the river. I tied him to a tree and suddenly noticed my drone flashing at the bottom of the river. I was going around to the other side and going across the rocks when I slipped jammed three fingers on my left hand. I caught myself and managed to get across the river. I walked to where the drone was and triumphantly ripped it out of the water and shut it off. My dog was wagging his tail at me across the river. It was a good day. I knew the video would be safe on that card. You know those evil stinging locusts from the Biblical apocalypse? Oh really you do? I met one of them that day. You have no idea what you're talking about. They're rotten! That sucker ripped me a new one. I ran through the woods to shake it and finally did. I'm glad nobody saw it though. They'd have thought me to be insane. I was actually laughing. The irony was killing me. I ended up with a much shorter river sequence than I wanted. I learned to edit and fade really fast. The drone was fortunately insured.

This is where the books I haven't even tried to sell until now currently reside.
https://www.amazon.com/R.-Hawkins/e/B0157D6F76/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0