Growing up in Houston, you’d think I had grown up living the city life. In many ways, yes…when in Rome…but I had the great fortune of being raised around my grandparents’ homestead and with a variety of farm animals that my parents dabbled with over the years. I grew up in the garden, wearing bonnets and work aprons made by my grandma. We were surrounded by cows, a horse or two, goats, pigs, chickens, rabbits, dogs, cats and later on a large variety of exotic birds that my grandparents raised. Mornings in the garden and tending and milking animals followed by warm, humid evenings relaxing in lawn chairs under the porch made up a day in my life. We lived an “outdoors lifestyle” but it was a far stretch from the outdoors lifestyle I have discovered a passion for since moving to Maine in 2009.
Maine has become my personal heaven on earth. I never realized how out of place I had been during my entire adult life until I set foot on this soil. From the first visit to check things out before settling on the big move, I was home. It was a surreal feeling standing on the edge of these woods and on top of the cliffs overlooking the Atlantic Ocean and having that feeling that I had finally found MY path. Four years behind me and not one single regret have proven that I was correct. This is the life I was meant to live.
Soon after moving to Maine, I set about pursuing every activity I could think of (and brave) along with my family. We hiked, camped, and did more sightseeing than I thought possible. We learned to canoe and kayak and started fishing avidly during the summer months, as well as spending time on the ice during hard water season. We’ve hunted bear, deer, turkey and partridge and put more miles in on the dirt roads in the last four years than I had in my entire life. Over the past year, the kids and I have begun learning about archery with the goal of adding bow hunting to our annual activities. We’ve been living our dream life with zeal, and I have become a passionate outdoors woman. The only thing I felt I was personally missing along this exciting new journey was an outdoorsman.
Through a series of life events and some major changes, I found myself traveling down a vastly different path and really wanted someone – the right kind of someone – to share the journey with. My “someone” had to be a man who would not only be by my side during an unlimited variety of outdoors activities, but he also had to sincerely enjoy all that the lifestyle has to offer. I had never had the benefit of a partner who was a true outdoorsman, and the idea of a “paddling partner” or “hunting honey” appealed to me greatly. I knew I’d *know* him when I met him. I had all but given up and sworn off the whole dating scene, and then I met Dennis. What a perfect match he’s been.
We had a number of friends in common through the logging industry in Maine, with Dennis working many years for one of the local logging companies, and found an instant and easy connection as we began to talk and compare notes. The man I quickly got to know was all he was cracked up to be…and so much more! I found him to be a great man, an amazing father to his three grown children, proud papa to two super sweet little boys, and he was the quintessential outdoorsman I’d been dreaming of. We spent many hours talking about our families, our kids and our shared life experiences – good experiences and bad. We talked about his years of adventures hunting bear, deer, partridge, turkeys, sledding with his own team of dogs, flying small planes as a certified pilot, raising all sorts of animals, horses he keeps for his daughter and grandson to enjoy, building his amazing cabin in the Maine woods, cutting and milling the lumber off his land to build a hawk house from scratch, etc. Yep, I was highly impressed!
We connected on so many levels, I was just astounded, and I found myself listening at the other end of the phone with pure excitement as he shared some amazing and often hilarious stories. I hadn’t laughed – or blushed – that way in a very long time. Yep, this man was definitely worth getting to know better. I was chomping at the bit to get out there and start sharing in some of these incredible adventures with him. We agreed to meet on a Sunday and had plans for an outing…but after the second week of nightly three and four hour conversations, he couldn’t wait to meet. Sweet! By Friday, he was on my doorstep, and we were on our way! Our first date was a simple evening Jeep ride and relatively uneventful, but when he returned again Sunday for our originally scheduled date, boy did the fun begin!
In addition to his many outdoors skills, Dennis is a falconer and has spent the last several months raising and training Kahn, a goshawk. He had a red tailed hawk previously, but his dream was to find and raise a goshawk, so he spoke about it very passionately, as he began teaching me all about the bird and the process of training him to hunt. I’d never even heard of the sport until meeting him, but what an absolutely amazing concept and activity and a perfect collaboration between man and wildlife. The second day we got together, he brought Kahn and we took him down to a nearby gravel pit for a training session.
Dennis getting ready to release Kahn, a goshawk, for a simulated training hunt.
I was absolutely in awe watching man and wild bird, working as companions. Being the adventurous soul that I am, I wanted my turn!
An absolutely amazing experience being in close contact with a hawk!
It was truly an amazing feeling being in contact with the hawk – my first of many new experiences shared with Dennis. An even better feeling…sharing my passion for the outdoors with a true outdoorsman and great partner at my side. I realized very quickly what I’d been missing in my life. I have a lot of lost time to make up for!
We have since spent every weekend together, sharing, learning, talking, laughing…we have hunted side by side, walked out of the woods holding hands between us and a rifle on each of our shoulders, driven the countryside in his Jeep, hiked for many hours through the thick woods around his house, worked together training the hawk, and spent time hanging out with the kids and grandkids. And for all the ground we’ve covered the last few months…I find myself sitting in the living room of his beautiful cabin in the woods, looking out over the front porch and listening to the horses playing around in the snow…daydreaming about setting up a hunting blind this fall out behind his house along the edge of a new cut. I’ll tell you more about the latest project he has going on around here and another learning experience I have the benefit of sharing with him – next time!
Maine Outdoors Woman 