A note to say, I owned it!

I attended a tiny thing this week and checked off a colossal goal on my ‘You Only Live Once’ checklist…

I went to ARCHERY!

The significance of this is massive, near immeasurable, and it has propelled me forward at a rate I completely under estimated. On Saturday night I was procrastinating horribly, gawking at the rain in an attempt to find an excuse not to go out the next morning.
‘You’ll be too hung over,’ I told myself. ‘You really deserve a sleep in…’

No, I do NOT deserve a sleep in! I deserve to be the boss of my life, not some passenger paying zero attention as the years whiz by void of achievement.
Luckily, my ‘coach’ Donna was not easily swayed. She kept nudging, gently encouraging, not giving one inch of slack to allow me to pull away. With one final shove from Husband (and by shove, I mean a shout from his perch on the couch), I was out to door and into the weather.

Nervous, certain I would miss the turn off and drive aimlessly around the bush for the next hour, I drove at a crawl down the muddy track to the club until I noticed an unusually large squad of 4WDs and cars among the trees. Hurrah – target acquired!

Get it? Target? Archery? Never mind…

Still nervous, literately shivering with heart palpitations, I went to the club house not entirely sure what to expect. What I found was extraordinary.
Country towns, mining towns, are known for their kind, friendly residents. I stand convinced every nice, welcoming soul in town is a member of this club. And that is not even close to an exaggeration. Even the collection of feral goat horns lined up for measuring were accommodating!

I was promptly handed a cute red compound bow and a small collection of arrows, shown the correct stance and action and snap! Off it went… into the bale behind the target!
‘Beginner’s luck,’ I thought and nocked another arrow.

Snap, thump.

*birds chirping happily in the drizzle*

I. Hit. The. Target.

Not the side of it, or the top edge. Right in the shit-darn MIDDLE!
Shot three was not as spectacular, but still whacked into the target at a great rate of knots.

It would pay to mention at this point, that the ‘target’ was in fact a cardboard feral goat. I have no particular appreciation for feral goats and so began ‘The Battle of Reyno and the Goat Pansy’.

By 10am, Goat Pansy was a shredded mess of paper pulp fluttering in the mild wet season wind. My arrows weren’t the only ones to hammer into its card and ink side. There were other beginners along for the ride, all doing well in the overcast light. For my part, I kept shooting just to prove the good shots weren’t flukes. I had my fair share of hairy misses, but nothing could deter me from taking the next shot, and the next.

In a week or so I will be attending AA – Archers Anonymous; the support group for straight up addicts of the sport. I’ve purchased a bow and every accessory I could decipher the function of, I wander around waiting for the next time I can go for a round and I really need to stop ogling at the pictures of the bow online.

And, as if by some small yet not so insignificant miracle, I find myself staring down another weekend at home, as uneventful and open ended as so many before. But I don’t see Sunday morning as a day of rest and sleeping off a god-awful wine hangover.
I see myself scurrying out of bed and driving with confidence down the track, safe in the knowledge that I am the boss of my life and not another day will go by without a measure of achievement.