09/14/2026
Holy Smokes š®
This will be a long one.
First off, thank you for following me on social media.
Second, if you have only recently started following me because of your interest in our āHand of Manā Museum of Natural History, Cultural Arts and Conservation, you might be surprised that I am posting this photo.
Very likely, you will not understand what this photograph represents to me.
Please, I ask for your tolerance and that you read on.
To everyone else, those who have followed me for years, you will already know most of what I am about to write, so it is up to you if you want to read on.
If you choose not to read on, this will probably answer your question: 68 Ā½ inches wide.
Now, back to the rest of you.
I live a āField to Tableā lifestyle.
That means I donāt buy meat at the supermarket; I eat wild game. And it isnāt legal to ābuyā wild game meat here in Canada. The only way to get it, is to hunt for it, like every single one of our ancestors did.
I grew up in a trailer park, on the outskirts of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan and if my father, Hal, didnāt get a moose each fall, we ate macaroni and chickens from our cousinās farm.
So, for me, moose meat has always been a part of my staple diet. Caribou, deer, fish and seafood (all that I catch myself) are also on the menu when I want a change of diet.
My wife, Serena, is a lifetime vegetarian, and I also love eating vegetables, so we grow a huge garden and have an apple, plum and pear orchard. We pick wild berries and can, freeze, dry or otherwise put food away for the winter.
We also happen to love w**e, so we grow our own grapes in our own vineyard and drink our own w**e.
Because of the āproviding animal protein for yourselfā lifestyle I live, I have a deep understanding of Natureās irrefutable continuum, life begets death, begets life begets death.
So, for me, this photo represents a cherished memory of an event that has allowed me to pay respect to AND to be an active participant in that reality.
The hundreds of pounds of 100% organic meat from this moose, will go to feed my family and our friends and a good part of it will also go to the First Nations elders in the local community, those who are too incapacitated to hunt a moose for themselves, but still desire to live the āField to Tableā lifestyle that has always been their way of life.
This photo, at its essence is NOT about ego, as the close-minded ideologues will scream.
It is a snapshot of a spiritual moment.
Whether it is taking a photo or painting the animal on a cave wall, it is a ritual.
It is a ceremony.
It is a ātouching of the ancestral soulā that exists inside all of usā¦but that few of us will ever access.
