The Night We Hit a Deer

I mentioned in my 2024 year-end recap that one of the bigger stories of the year happened on the way home from a Chiefs game in December.

We hit a deer.

Thankfully, there were no injuries. But my Jeep was totaled.

This one hurt a little more than just losing a vehicle.

It was the first nice car I’d ever bought myself. When I bought it, it only had about 4,000 miles on it!

I had no idea that day how many places that Jeep would eventually take me. I towed it behind the RV on more adventures than I could count! The Jeep and the RV: my Beauty and the Beast.

So seeing it sitting there, damaged and leaking fluid on the ground after hitting the deer, was a pretty awful way to end the night.

Chris’s First Question

Once we knew we were both okay, I assumed we’d worry about the Jeep next.

Chris had a different priority.

I’m pretty sure he went to check for the deer before he ever looked at the car.

His first thought was whether we could get the conservation department’s approval to take it.

We live where we do and already have experience processing our own meat, so it wasn’t a crazy question. While we were waiting and making the report with the officer, he asked. Dispatch contacted a conservation officer, and we got permission.

So that wasn’t the end of the night after all.

Getting Home

After everything was sorted out at the scene, we called Chris’s mom sometime after midnight and asked if she could come get us.

She did.

She took us home while my Jeep was towed into town.

The 2 A.M. ATV Ride

Chris went back out with the ATV to recover the deer.

At around 2 in the morning.

Because apparently that’s what we do now.

He brought it home, and then we started figuring out what to do with it.

It wasn’t exactly how I’d planned to spend the night.

From the Road to the Freezer

Over the next few days, we turned that deer into a whole lot of food.

There was ground meat, jerky, sausage, summer sausage, breakfast sausage, Italian sausage, backstrap, roasts, and stew meat.

Some went into the freezer, and some we canned.

By the time we were finished, we had quite a spread laid out.

And honestly, looking at all of that food was a little surreal.

A few days earlier, we’d been driving home from a Chiefs game.

That’s a pretty good example of how different our life is now.

It Wasn’t the Plan

Would I have chosen to fill the freezer this way?

Absolutely not.

I would have preferred to keep my Jeep and avoid the whole middle-of-the-night adventure.

But we’ve chosen a life where we’re willing to use what we have, learn how to do things ourselves, and make the most of what comes our way.

This wasn’t exactly what we had in mind.

But we weren’t going to waste it.

And that’s how a really bad night ended with a lot of meat in the freezer.