I Shot an Arrow into the Air...

There is only one sport I have even a passable skill in – archery. I figured this out as an adult, accompanying my daughters to Mother/Daughter camp when they were in the Girls Scouts. The camp experience on the whole was horrible, with the only bright spot being the discovery of archery. Who knew there was an outdoor sport that required no sweating?

I bring this up because we pulled out the archery equipment yesterday and shot arrows at a target we keep at the lake house. Several Christmases ago my family gave me a beautiful bow and a dozen arrows. The meadow between the back door of the cabin and the lake is the perfect place to set up the target and shoot, as long as a deer doesn’t wander by and provided we keep the dogs in the house.

Yesterday my daughters, my husband and I had a great time taking turns shooting at the target and enjoying a beautiful spring day. Then my husband, who is usually quite sane, acted upon an idea I knew had been forming all afternoon. My first clue was when he began reciting Longfellow:

I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.

After an afternoon of shooting, and perhaps one too many beers, he announced, “I’m going to shoot one more time, just to see how far it will go.” Before I could tell him what a stupid idea that was, I heard the ping of the bowstring and the arrow was off. How far did it go? We finally spied the feathers on the arrow, through binoculars, just before they sank in the middle of the lake.

There are a couple of morals to this story:
1. Poetry, beer, and archery don’t mix.
2. Just because you can shoot farther, doesn’t mean you can shoot better!

See accompanying photos for documentation of my skills, and not one arrow did I send into the lake.