Started with a bb gun at the ripe age of 8. Had a dog and hunted birds since I was 12, and I've had 3 dogs and hunted birds ever since.
Dad took me out to the Berkshires when I was 10, killed my first deer at 12. Killed a bunch with the shotgun by the time I was 18, then needed a challenge, got heavily into bowhunting and killed deer with every type of bow made, longbow, recurve, and compound.... even made my own recurves for a while in my 20's and 30's. Hunted heavily in NH, CT, and MA thru the years mostly with the bow trying to kill mature bucks, and filling the freezer when needed. Most of it an alone pursuit, because it's tough to get people like minded, and willing to sacrifice the time and effort and persistence to be a true hunting partner. My Dad was always closest and the one I learned from and the one I trusted to meet me on time at 4am or whatever time we needed to be on stand, and the one to help me drag a deer out of some swamp at 8pm.
I also, taught my son how to bird hunt with the dog, we still do that together regularly, he killed his first pheasant at like 10, He also killed his first deer at ten with a rifle. His first bow kill buck at 12 with a compound. He doesn't like the deer thing as much as I did, plus he's into 2 legged does now....that's typical, I'm assuming he'll come back to me at some point and we'll do some deer hunting again.....but if he doesn't that's OK too. I know he's always out to tag along with me with the dog every year.
Being in my mid 40's, and having a bunch of 130-160" deer on the wall, my biggest 225#, all from New England, I'm slowing it down as far as deer goes. My dad has 4-5 he got as well, I'm pretty much come full circle and have gone thru all the stages. I'll remember those hunts forever. and some of the time I put in and stuff I did to get certain animals I targeted when I was in my 20's and 30's I laugh at now. But those deer on the wall do end up as dust collectors....not a lot of people nowadays care to hear the stories. But there was a lot of hard work and time sacrifice in most cases, put into every one of them. Sometimes I wonder if it was all worth it, I could have probably learned more and made more money instead or something.......whatever.
Now I'm all about spending time with family and friends, and if I can work in a hunt doing that great. I belong to a club where we shoot birds and mostly shoot the shxt, and that is plenty fine for me. I train the shooters for the youth pheasant hunt and it brings me a lot of joy to do that and give back a little. I'm always glad to take anyone out that wants to learn......mostly bird hunting, because I'm not super into the deer thing anymore, newbies are better off learning from someone that has the "deer bug"