Former Soil Conservation Service employee and longtime writer Mat Taylor offers his outdoors column for Dispatch Record readers. He can be contacted at (254) 518-2262 or via e-mail at mntaylor@wildblue.net. I hope everyone had a good Christmas. My son Matthew came down from Canyon and spent a few days with us. He was a lot of help as he cut us a good supply of wood, helped me feed cattle and filled my deer feeders with corn.

My immediate family observes one holiday tradition, and that is having an early Christmas morning breakfast. We went to my brother’s home this year and enjoyed a full breakfast with F.A. and his wife Louella and my mother.

While Matthew was here, he spent some time hunting. He wanted some venison for jerky and sausage.

This has not been a good hunting season for me. I have spent only one afternoon in the deer blind due to other obligations and some health problems.

A few days before Thanksgiving, it was trash pickup day, and I was carrying out our trash in plastic bags to my pickup to take them to our containers. I tripped on a bag and fell down our back door step. I sprained my left ankle and had several cuts and bruises as I landed on the sidewalk.

Luckily my doctor said I did not have any broken bones. It took me several weeks to get back to normal activity, and then I contracted shingles on my right leg. The rash and blisters covered my leg from the thigh to my ankle.

I have always heard that shingles are very painful, and I now believe it. I wouldn’t wish shingles on my worst enemy, even if I had an enemy. After one trip to the doctor for the sprained ankle, there was another trip for the shingles.

Doc prescribed several medications to help ease the pain and discomfort.

Shingles affect the nerve endings, and that has made my leg numb and has caused difficulty in walking. After several weeks, I am getting better and am able to walk without my walking stick.

If you had chicken pox as a child, you probably will contract shingles sometime later in life. I would recommend everyone get the shingles vaccination to prevent this malady. Somehow or other, I did not realize a vaccine is available.

Anyway, I hope I will feel like hunting during the late spike and antlerless season, which runs for two weeks following the regular season.

Due to the sprained ankle and shingles, I have been using a walking stick to assist me. I call it my contraband stick and have had numerous comments about it. Many people asked where I got it.

Several years ago, my brother and I spent a couple of days in Big Bend National Park. One morning we drove to Hot Springs on the banks of the Rio Grande River.

In the early 1900s, J.O. Langford developed the area around the springs as a resort. He also constructed a bathhouse for persons to bathe in the springs, as Langford claimed they had healing powers. Many of the structures and ruins are still visible near the springs.

We walked to the springs, and they are still flowing their hot mineral waters. We then noticed two men across the river on the Mexico side. They held up a bundle of hiking/walking sticks to indicate there were for sale. I asked how much, and one answered five dollars. We said OK, and they jumped into the swift-flowing water with their bundle and waded across the river.

The water was up to their chest in the deepest part of the river, and I thought for a minute they might drown. They made it across, however, and after looking over all the sticks we each chose one and paid the men. They then waded back to the Mexico side.

Later we were told the Park Service does not encourage these sales from Mexico, and if a park ranger had seen our sticks they would have confiscated them as contraband.

I could not understand this attitude. These men were just trying to make a few dollars to earn a living for their families. At least they were not smuggling drugs or coming into the U.S. as illegal aliens.

My walking stick is made from a sotol stalk that was sanded and hand-painted with several colors and designs. Boquillas, Mexico, is written on the stick. The man who made my hiking/walking stick probably spent all day working on it. At five dollars apiece, that is pretty low wages.

I did not need assistance when I purchased the stick but with a sprained ankle and shingles, it has sure come in handy the last few weeks. At this writing, I am feeling better and using my walking staff less and less.