Wild and Crazy Ride

I was a teenager living in Arizona. I loved the outdoors. Loved to hunt and fish. Usually I did these things alone. Seems like I have always been somewhat of a loner. A personality fault or personal preference one or the other. I had my share of friends. "High School buddies". We all have had them. Some endure and become lifelong friends while others are gone at graduation. Howard was a High School Buddy. One weekend one summer Howard and I decided to go hunting. We packed up our "desert car" with enough food and drink to last a month even though we were only going for the weekend. We had our trusty hunting rifles and plenty of ammunition. We were ready.
We arrived at our chosen camp site just a couple of miles above the Pima indian reservation, set up camp and started out on our hunt. We didn't care what we were hunting. We were HUNTING and that was what mattered. I shot and killed 4 empty tin cans (Maneaters every one) and Howard killed 2 "No Hunting" signs. We were exhausted. We went back to camp to eat and call it a day.
There is a rule among hunters. No loaded weapons in camp. No exeptions. So I unloaded my rifle and stretched out on my sleeping bag to rest up. Howard was unloading his rifle when it went off. It felt like he had hauled off and kicked me. The look on his face was of sheer disbelief.
We decided that I maybe should see a doctor. It took us about 15 seconds to break camp and load up the desert car and bug out.
Let me back up and talk a little about the "Desert Car". She was a 1948 Oldsmobile convertible. Howard and I paid $50 for her and spent numerous weekends getting her running. She didn't have any fabric in her top but we didn't care. We were in Arizona after all. At one time she had been owned by a para palegic who had fitted her with hand controls for gas pedal and brakes. It was a real kick to sit up on the backs of the seats and drive around using just the hand controls. Oh, and she didn't have headlights either.
Anyway, back to the desert.
When we had everything loaded up in the desert car we took off. If we stayed on the roads and went around the indian reservation it would have taken an hour or more to get to civilization so Howard decided to cut across the desert, through the reservation and into town the back way.
Two problems. One, there were no roads. and Two, we didn't have any headlights and it was dark. To me these were problems. To Howard...no big deal. Off we went clattering and banging through the night. Howard sitting up on the back of the drivers seat, throttle wide open, steering with one hand and holding a flashlight in the other. I was laying in the back seat wearing a 16 year old's version of a tourniquet around my thigh and praying that I wouldn't die in a car wreck. Everything was going pretty good until we became airborn and landed in a dry creek bed. I ended up in the front seat, Howard landed about 10 feet in front of the car, still holding the flash light. We were totally stuck. Howard decided to run to the indian police station and get some help so off he went. I was left with the car. I was surprised at how dark it gets in the desert at night and how clearly I could hear the coyotes yowling. I knew they could smell my blood and that any minute they would attack. But not without a fight. I hobbled around to the back of the wrecked desert car, retrieved my trusty rifle and stood guard, hunkered down in the back seat. That was how Howard and the indian policeman found me 2 hours later. Asleep on guard duty.
The trip from the creek bed to the city limits was fairly uneventful. The Scottsdale PD and an ambulance were waiting at the city limits and I was taken to the hospital. The docs at the hospital decided it would be better to leave the bullet alone than to try to dig it out. So that is why, to this day, I have a bullet in my leg.