Morning comes twice on opening day: secondly with the appearance of the sun’s virgin rays seeping through the branches, but firstly upon the sound of the first shots ringing through the November sky. These first shots are always far off, a desolate boom faintly echoing. You feel it more than hear it. Low frequencies ripple through the cold, still air. They’re usually miles away, and more likely the wasted premature efforts from a green hunter barely perceiving movement in the still-mostly-dark morning than any real attempt at killing anything. This solitary rumble to hearken the new day is often isolated, and followed by a prolonged period of silence. After ten to fifteen minutes, and the arrival of morning light’s first few ounces, more shots are heard, this time a tad closer and a notch louder, more of a brazen crash than a dull roar. Birds begin to pay more attention to their surroundings at this point. Squirrels slowly inch their way down the trunks of the larger trees. Everybody’s awake now, but the deer have already been up for hours and are fully on the move.

This is “be quiet” time. You’re done trudging your way through the snow and noisy leaves to your blind or tree stand. You’ve had two refills from your thermos, and you’ve since replaced its cup and stopper. If you smoke, you’ve since put out your cigarette. Your gloves and mask are on and you’ve moved your body into a comfortable position.

So now you sit silently, still—the only moving organs in your body being are the tiny orbs of your eyes slowly scanning the treeline—east to west … pause … and then west to east … repeat—and the spasming of your stomach and intestines from the onslaught of that morning’s jitter juice.

The shots continue en masse for about an hour and a half. You hear one about a mile west in the cedar swamps. And then half-a-mile north in the pine groves. And then a quarter-mile south in the sandy hills near where the old logging road intersects the main road. And then three shots east of you where you’re half certain the fellas at Peace Camp set up near the beaver marsh.

The shots are chaotic at first, but as the early light waxes you begin to hear patterns. You’ll hear a shot three clicks to the southeast, and then a closer one two clicks southeast, and again one click south-southeast, and you can visualize the herd breaking its way toward you at full speed, meandering through the brambles and thickets, around trunks and downed timbers, across low trickles and down game paths forged by hooves since forgotten from maybe last year or 500 years ago.

Sometimes you see the flashes of brown heading your way and your hands tremble with too much eagerness (and caffeine). Sometimes they bound directly to you, land directly at your feet, and you earn the chance to finish the day early. Sometimes you hear the nearing shots cease, and nothing precipitates. “What the hell?” you mutter to yourself, insisting the herd has no doubt evaporated out of existence mere inches from your stand.

Sometimes the shots grow closer, and then further away again before you have the chance to see the subjects they’re shooting toward. Sometimes you think it's because you skipped showering that morning, and your downwind stank gave away your position, and you curse skipping wetness to save crucial time because you hit the snooze button too many times.

And then sometimes nothing happens at all. And you’re alone in the woods with funny clothes on.