sounds like

you lived in the 'burbs. I was a quarter mile from another house. my parents. I went deer hunting all over the place one year, I was going to shoot one on my brother-in-law's tag. like the morels, I didn't get a look at any deer while I was out of my car. I kept the shotgun in the trunk. whenever I quit a hunt, I felt it unlucky to unload the gun. so I would empty the gun by shooting it. I was finally down to one shell. so I pulls into my driveway late one day and I see a deer. I turn off the engine and watch as the deer (it was a stag) settled in to nest for the night. it was on the other side of the fence and it was no more than one hundred feet away. so I takes the shotgun shell (deer load) out of the glove compartment (the law says your gun has to be unloaded while in the car) and slowly open the door and go to the trunk. I take the shotgun out of the trunk and load it, leaving the trunk up and the door open. I did not want to slam anything and spook the deer. I went back out the driveway in order to circle the fence and then proceeded to slowly, quietly approach where I had last seen the deer. I finally got close enough to recognize his antlers, as from a distance they looked like the small branches from the small trees right there. well, I must have made some kind of noise because the deer slowly rose up, while I slowly shouldered and aimed the gun. we stayed there a moment, looking at each other. I guess he got tired of looking at me before I got tired of looking at him, because he slowly turned, wiggled his little tail, and bounded off, over the hill and out of sight. that when I realized that I had not pulled the trigger. the next day, I gave that last bullet and the shotgun to my thirteen year old nephew. he never got a deer with that gun either, but he and his dad bruised their shoulder with their many attempts. no, I could never get them to listen to me on how to shoulder a shotgun. some day, I will tell you more about my blond nephew.