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A candid conversation with world renowned hunter and conservationist Jim Shockey. As a hunter, Jim has deeper connection than most with the reality of life and death, but now faces the unthinkable challenge of loosing the love of his life to terminal lung cancer. This is an incredibly moving and inspiring conversation that delves deep into Jim’s passion for life and explores the inspiration and purpose of his highly anticipated new book, Call me Hunter.
Pre-order Call Me Hunter here: https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Call-Me-Hunter/Jim-Shockey/9781668010358 Website: https://jimshockey.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jimshockeyofficial/
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Host Instagram - @Bader.Trav https://www.instagram.com/bader.trav
Silvercore Instagram - @SilvercoreOutdoors https://www.instagram.com/silvercoreoutdoors
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The Silvercore Podcast explores the mindset and skills that build capable people. Host Travis Bader speaks with hunters, adventurers, soldiers, athletes, craftsmen, and founders about competence, integrity, and the pursuit of mastery, in the wild and in daily life. Hit follow and step into conversations that sharpen your edge.
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Travis Bader: I'm Travis Badder,
and this is the Silvercore Podcast.
Silvercore has been providing its
members with the skills and knowledge
necessary to be confident and proficient
in the outdoors for over 20 years, and
we make it easier for people to deepen
their connection to the natural world.
If you enjoy the positive and educational
content we provide, please let others
know by sharing, commenting, and
following so that you can join in on
everything that Silvercore stands for.
If you'd like to learn more
about becoming a member of the
Silvercore Club and community,
visit our website at Silvercore.ca
he's a true legend in the
hunting and outdoor world.
A renowned conservationist, award-winning
television host, and a passionate
adventure With over four decades of
experience exploring the most remote and
pristine landscapes around the globe.
This man is a wealth of
knowledge to share with us.
Welcome to the one and only Jim Shockey.
Jim Shockey: No way to go now.
I've gotta live up to that
for the next, uh, yep.
Let's just end it right there.
Yeah.
Thank you.
It's been nice here.
They really, I figured
Travis Bader: I'd front
load that one a little bit.
I, I, I always figure, you know, if you're
gonna have somebody into your house, you
don't get them to introduce themself.
So thank you for being on
the Silvercore Podcast.
You know, the podcast, our core values
are primarily about positivity and
sharing people's passion with others,
and you have passion in spades.
I have been doing some research
and preparing for this podcast.
And holy crow, the number of
interests and pursuits that you
have endeavored on in your lifetime
thus far are kind of mind boggling.
And I, I'm looking down, I mean,
you've, you're, you're obviously, you
enjoy hunting and fishing, but you
also enjoy literature and philosophy.
You're a musician, you're an inventor.
I don't know if many people know that,
but, uh, a photographer, an author,
you've got an upcoming book called
Call Me Hunter, which I have already
on the pre-order list for, which looks
amazing, which I want to be able to
talk about in this podcast as well.
But, um, my hope was to be able to
talk about things that maybe haven't
been covered in as great as depth and.
You know, with the Silvercore Podcast,
we're always trying to find different
ways to not necessarily preach to
the choir or talk to the choir,
but to find people outside of that.
And I get the sense that's what
you're doing with your book as well.
Am I, am I on the right track with that?
Jim Shockey: Yeah, a hundred percent.
Uh, I mean, we, we can preach
to the converted all day long.
We, we have a similar,
we're kindred spirits.
Our mindset's the same.
We common sense is, is common with us.
So, you know, there, there's a lot of
people that don't, they, they would
appreciate it and they would recognize it.
They would relate to it, but they
don't hear our message because
we're always talking to each other.
So, so the novel, the, the number
one purpose isn't to make money.
I mean, we're giving everything away.
My wife and I, you know, to a foundation,
everything we're, what are you gonna do?
Bury yourself with a pot
full of dollar bills.
So, so, hmm.
You know, the purpose of the novel
was, was to reach outside of our
core audience that, um, that already
know how we feel, how we think.
Hopefully, you know, that
audience will also appreciate it.
But, uh, you know, we, we've had
doors closed to us for 60 years now.
We've been vilified, marginalized
in the mainstream media.
Stereotyped.
I mean, we're, you know,
buffoons that spit on the
floor, no higher sensibilities.
And, and that's just not true.
We all know that's not
true, but that is bad news.
It sells for $2.
You know, good news sells for $1.
They're not gonna say, yeah, these guys
are actually sentient human beings.
And, and they're, you know, they,
they do have higher sensibilities.
So, you know, I felt the only way to reach
out there is to play their game in their
world, which means, you know, literature,
they, they appreciate that, um,
fictional thrillers, commercial fiction.
I mean that these are the hardest.
Genres to actually break into.
And, and I mean, ask Jock car, he, you
know, he's broken into it in spades.
He's opened the door crack and
thankfully, you know, he's, you
know, ushering some of us in as well
as many as, as, uh, you know, he
feels he wants to put his name on.
And he did that with me.
He got me where I, you know, I mean, go
try and get a, an agent in that world
to, to represent your work, your, your
creative novel manuscript, and then try
and get a publisher, a big publisher
like Simon and Schuster is the biggest.
Try and get him to read it.
They get a thousand
unsolicited manuscripts a week.
You know, when I was told, I mean, to
try and get your novel read by anybody.
Anyway, uh, Jack was instrumental
in opening that door and, you
know, sliding me through it.
And now I'm gonna open that door
a little wider, hopefully, if
this, if this novel is a success.
So, so it is to reach out to
open doors to be able to tell our
story what, what that we all know.
Is a good story that needs to be a told
and represented in know what we do,
conservation, the, the, you know, the fact
that we care about the wildlife around
the world, that that needs to be told.
So, so that's why I wrote the
novel to get into their world,
give me a voice in their world.
You know, as
Travis Bader: Shane Mahoney,
he, he said something to me,
which really kind of stuck.
And he says, you know, just
because you're right, right?
You can jump into that river and you can
be going in the right direction where
you need to go, but you're fighting the
river the entire way with your hands up.
You're never gonna win.
He says, if you can find something
that's floating down the river, something
that's got the public consciousness,
that's got the attention of everybody
else, and jump on that and maybe grab
a paddle and be able to steer that in a
direction that's gonna be beneficial to
everybody, you're much further ahead.
And he looked at it from the, the food
connection with hunting and nature and.
And the, uh, the amount that food is
in the zeitgeist and whatever that 20
mile diet and all the rest, and how
foraging is, um, gaining in popularity.
And he says, you know, if we can tell the
story through food, then that's one way
we can grab that public, um, attention
and say, you know, there's also this
story of hunting on the side over here.
How, how are you looking at doing
Jim Shockey: that?
Yeah.
You know, the, I think the, the food is
a, is a, a, a partial, a partial solution.
I, it's very difficult to defend
food is the reason we're hunting.
And it'll get you out of an argument at a
cocktail party with, with a certain crowd.
I only hunt.
But I do it for food.
And that's the only reason I hunt.
You know, I eat everything.
I kill that, that works to a degree, like
I say, at a cocktail party level, but it,
it doesn't stand the test of, of scrutiny.
Um, you know, it, it would be
disingenuous for any of us to say we
hunt for food, we do hunt for food.
Yes.
But that's, it is not because we
have to, it's because we choose to.
And, and the cost.
I mean, economically, you don't
fly down to Mexico to hunt COOs,
deer, um, you know, for food.
I mean, it just, but it, but you
can also say it's not for trophy
because you're eating the food.
Right.
So, so, yes, it's true.
And because we may want to spend
$8,000 a pound for our food, you
know, that's our choice, you know?
So, so again, it's, but, but it, it, it,
it doesn't, it won't stand close scrutiny.
Not nowadays.
I think you have to have a, um,
A spiritual connection with the
animals, the, um, with the wildlife,
you know, you have to show that
we have a responsibility, a, a,
a philosophy that includes it.
And again, I, I'll bring it back
to a religion, you know, where the
outdoors is, our cathedral, the forest,
the mountains, the hanging valleys.
And I think that's, that will
stand the test of, of close
scrutiny because we all feel it.
We just may not be able to articulate it.
And from someone looking outside at
what we do, we're, we're smiling, we're
holding an animal, and we're smiling.
How can you be happy?
You're happy cuz you killed something.
But no, no, that's not it at all.
We're happy because we've,
we've, um, touched our ancestral
soul and, and that mm-hmm.
That's an argument or that's at least
a, a philosophy that it can be argued,
it, it can be defended, uh, um, far more
to, to somebody that really looks at it.
Deeply than, than just, it's a,
it's the food, food, food works.
You know?
Like I said, it'll get you out
of a, an argument at a party.
But it's not, it, it, it, it
also, it throws a bunch of
the hunters under the bus.
It implies that I'm okay,
but they're not okay.
Which, you know, I, I've used the
analogy, it's like a, a three toed
dinosaur talking to a for toed
dinosaur dinosaur and saying, you
know, I'm far more involved than you.
I have three toes.
You know, meanwhile, the, the comics
coming up, both of them, you, no,
you're just argu, you're both dinosaurs.
So, and I don't mean that in a derogatory
sense, dinosaurs lasted for Oh, I like it.
Yeah.
A hundred million years.
So, so, so that, that's why when someone
says, we just, I only hunt for food.
They only eat what I kill.
Oh, that's great.
What about wildlife management then?
What about predators?
You know, you're saying that you don't
kill a wolf, even though the wolves are
decimating the population of ungulates to
the point where it crashes the population.
Mm-hmm.
Nature works on boom and bust.
That's the counter argument.
And then, you know, you
say, well, wait a minute.
You know, we've created logging roads.
You know, you look at British Columbia
where I'm talking to you from right now.
Look at it, 60, 80 years ago
there was, you know, a few
logging roads, main, main lines.
Look at it.
Mm-hmm.
Now, compared to a, an
overlay map, it's like veins.
It's everywhere.
Well, as soon as you do that,
you create uber predators.
The wolves become uber predators.
They run the roads.
Now they don't have to go over dead
falls and around cliffs and cut
banks and, and, uh, rock bluffs.
They, you know, they now have to
just go down the road until they hit
a track where a deer that's out in
the field or out in the bushes, you
know, across the road to go find more
food, the wolves hit that track, boom.
Kill the animal.
Come back up, run the road again.
Now, You know, is there
scientific proof of that?
Not really.
Is is there common sense?
Oh yeah.
A whole lot of it, you know,
that that's what's happening.
So for someone that says, back to
the argument that they only kill
something they, you know, to eat
it and would never kill a wolf
and never deined to kill a wolf.
Well, that again, gets em
out of the ar you know, the
argument at a cocktail party.
But it doesn't answer what we should be
doing or doesn't accept responsibility,
which is management of the wildlife
species on a scientific basis.
So you're gonna have to
manage the predators.
Well, I don't eat wolves Well,
okay, so the wolves kill all the
ungulates and what do you eat?
Yeah.
Well, nature works on boom and bust.
I mean, you get this constant circling
around of, of, um, the simple truth
is that there, every wildlife species
in this world is managed nowadays.
From whales on down and, and to
think otherwise is, is utopia utopic?
It doesn't, it's not the reality.
And, and we have to manage.
You can't let nature do boom and bust
because there's 8 billion of us, us
25 billion chickens in this world.
There's 6 billion goats, 6 billion head of
cattle, 6 billion sheep y you know, that's
where the wildlife biomass is turned into.
We have to manage wildlife now.
We have to, because it's not nature.
When they wrote this boom and bus
cycle over hundreds of thousands
of years, and you know, they go
up, they go down populations and
the animals build up, predators.
Build up.
Yeah.
Boom.
And bust works when we're not around.
But, but, right.
So I, I, I just think it's a far more
complicated issue than just saying food.
You know, it's, it's food.
I, it's not defensible in the long run.
I
Travis Bader: agree.
And you can't stick your finger
in the bowl of water without
expecting to see some ripples.
And we've stuck our finger in
it a pretty big way, and now we
have to manage how that works.
That's,
Jim Shockey: um, eight, 8 billion of us.
That's, you know, there's
8 billion, 8 billion of
Travis Bader: us.
So I thought it kind of interesting
you're talking about the spiritual aspect.
You talked to any hunter out there and
that always ends up coming up Mo That's
something that most non-hunters might not
think about is that connection to nature.
That somebody who's out there in the
environment hunting has that deep sort
of connection and that that spirituality
side of things seems to be in high
demand nowadays with people seeking
answers and seeking, you know, since
Covid and everyone got locked up and
they're, uh, stuck in front of social
media and watching all this different
stuff coming in, something I found
really interesting is a number of public.
Uh, figures, reaching out, talking about
mental health, talking about spirituality,
talking about, um, talking about how, just
getting outside, how beneficial that is
for people to, whether that's, uh, on the
crystal ball, uh, side of things where
they're talking about grounding and being
out in, in nature and, uh, grounding their
electrical magnetic feel to other people.
Just talking about the, the, just
the calming and the, um, the mental
health benefits to being outside.
I, I think that's an interesting area.
That's a multi-billion
dollar industry in itself.
The whole mental health area, which I
don't know if it's been properly, um, Are
fully addressed in, in the hunting world.
Jim Shockey: No, it absolutely has not.
I mean, we, we, we know it.
We feel it.
So do I need to tell you about it?
You, we know when we're sitting in a camp
over a campfire and the sparks are going
up and the Northern Lights are above
us, and you know, we have our cup of
coffee, whatever it is, you know, cowboy
coffee, and, and we've had a good meal.
We've worked hard all day, fresh air.
We know it, but, and we'll talk about it.
We feel it there.
But how does that translate to talking
to everybody else that's not out there?
The ones chasing a second car, a bigger
TV screen, a, you know, a fancier
restaurant, they, they've, they don't
understand because they're not doing it.
And now when they're faced with
their mo own mortality, say, holy
cow, my, you know, this construct
of my world is, is actually, you
know, it's an upside down pyramid.
It, it's really tippy.
Again, 8 billion of us.
It's a, it's a tippy world we've created
and, and when it goes, you know, tips
over, or at least shakes, they, they
suddenly realize, whoa, you know,
these constructs that I've been working
for that I think are so important.
Uh, you know, uh, Oscar Delo,
Renta designer dress, I mean,
I don't even know any of these.
I know you sound Lorena.
It's terrible that I can
actually name a couple of them.
Chan Coco Chanel, you know, when
you, when you're striving for that,
and that's the most important thing.
And, and you know, you have your
poodle and you take it down to Central
Park and look at my view of all the
buildings, but then that, that starts
to wobble a little bit and suddenly
that, you know, penthouse Suite becomes
a tomb, a jail first, and then a tomb.
Because you can't go down the elevators,
you can't go down the stairwells.
You're encased in this.
This jail of, you know, people that you're
not supposed to be able to touch and see.
And, and it's not natural.
It shakes up their world.
And so that's why of course, they're
going to turn back to something that's
real, that they can touch, that they
can breathe, that they can feel,
uh, I gu I I guess feel sated, feel
satisfied that they're living a life
that is, is got value because it's
not value to have a a, a $3,000 suit.
It, you know, it is, if you live with
a bunch of other people that all think
the 300 or $3,000 suit is important,
but when something like Covid comes
along and Covid was a joke compared
to what's coming down the tubes for
us, you know that that's coming.
That, that's nature.
Na you know, nature gave a shot
across our bow on this one earlier.
I don't know nature, what, you
know, I mean, we're, we are part of
nature, we're instruments of nature.
So if we constructed this virus, you
know, we are acting at the behest of
nature and, and it's an experiment.
A again, you, you start getting
into a big philosophical
talk, uh, talk on this stuff.
Um, but it, it covid shook up a
lot of people's world and that's
why they needed something real.
That's why prices out in the country
went up for land because people wanted
to, the ability to walk out their door
and, and eat a radish from their garden.
You know, they didn't have
to rely on somebody far away.
They could, you know, get a
chicken and have it lay an egg.
Um, that, that's a pretty
alluring life when, pardon the
language shit hits the fan.
Mm-hmm.
And, and that's mm-hmm.
That's what happened, you know,
and, and it didn't really, but
they thought it did and that was
enough to, to shake up their world.
So, so yeah.
I, I, I think it's a good thing
that people are starting to
reach out into the outdoors, but.
We have to be careful
what we wish for too.
The flip side of that is 8 billion people.
Again, I keep coming back to that.
Mm-hmm.
You know, that's the issue.
So 8 billion people living in
the outdoors and wild and free.
Is it wild and free anymore?
Is there just 8 billion people from
New York City living where we used to
go and, and commune with nature, you
know, and then who, like I say, the
deeper you go down this rabbit hole,
okay, then, then who gets to do that?
You know, who does, who
gets to be a hunter?
Because you can't have 8
billion hunters out there.
We never did historically.
Not even percentage wise.
We never did.
10% of us were hunters and 90% of
us were support for the hunters.
Basically, we sup we supplied food and
we were good at it to varying degrees.
Um, you know that 10% and, and
the others tried when they had to
and they gathered when they could.
But really they were support
for, for what we were doing.
We were the ones that were providing.
So there there 8 million people.
There weren't 8 billion hunters.
So, you know, the whole tribe
wasn't hunters and, and.
Yeah, we're, we're gonna have to, it.
It's gonna be an interesting future.
I mean, talk to me in
10,000 years, I'll be that.
That'll be an interesting conversation.
You know, we saw it coming and we
didn't do anything about it, or
we couldn't do anything about it.
And in which case, is there
something that can be done about it?
I don't know.
I don't know what the solution take
a lot smarter person than me, but
I think we have to look at this
whole picture in, in a, um, not only
more worldly terms, but in, in, uh,
temporal terms in thousands of years.
What's, what's really happening out there?
8 billion people.
Mm-hmm.
If anybody thinks we're gonna be able
to maintain this population growth for
another thousand years, a thousand years.
I mean, a thousand years
ago wasn't that long ago.
I mean, 800 years ago,
it wasn't that long.
No.
Gangas Khan was running
around 800 years ago.
Only we're talking not a big long time
in, in, uh, certainly geological time.
It, it's a nothing so,
but a thousand years.
Let's talk about it.
We can't maintain this growth.
It's impossible.
The resources aren't here.
We're already, like I
say, how many chickens?
How 25 billion chickens?
Arguably the, the most adaptive
creature in the world is chickens.
So, so anyway, like I say, you, you,
you, if you start me on that, we, it
gets, it gets deep and it's not as
simple and facile as just, uh, you
know, going outdoors for fresh air.
There, there's a far, like I say,
our, we have our ancestral souls
inside us, and, and when our world
gets rocked, that's what we turn to.
And that belief structure, that,
that peace and freedom and, and
serenity, a sense of why, answering
why that's, that's important to us.
And that's what Covid did.
It, it shook up people's world.
Travis Bader: Yeah.
Even if it was in sort of an
illusionary way, the prospect of death
re real or perceived the prospect
of everything changing on them.
I, you know, a friend of mine and
he's a philosophy student, and he
says, Trav, the only thing, the only
thing that gives life value is death.
I'm like, what do you mean?
He says, well, think about it.
If you had infinite resources,
infinite money, that money's
not gonna have the same value.
Right?
That finite level to it is
what gives that item value.
And so many people, I think, will
go through their entire life and not
contemplate their own mortality until
it's smack dab right in front of them.
Um, hunters on the other hand, deal
with life and death and have a very.
Honest and intimate relationship with
it, which I think is one of the areas
that is possibly missing in society.
I know, um, Lieutenant Colonel
Dave Grossman in the States here
who wrote on Combat, on Killing
on Hunting or a recent one.
Um, but he talks about how death
being behind closed doors and
the effects it has on society.
Um, that's one full tangent that that
came to mind when you're talking there.
But the other one that I think
might be a more positive way to
even look at is if only 10% of the
people out there were hunters and
the other 90% were supporting them.
How do we celebrate those 90%
so that they feel valued for the
support that they're doing, and
they're a part of that conversation.
When I was in Germany recently, I was
talking, uh, with a fellow, he's the
head of firearms training and hunter
education for the Bavarian region.
And one of the things he's talking about
is, you know, a guy goes out and, uh, he's
successful on, on his haun guy or a girl,
and it's then incumbent on them to come
back and they're buying, buying drinks
and buying rounds for the rest of the crew
because they wouldn't have been successful
if they didn't have the camp cook, if
they didn't have the person helping, uh,
set things up with logistics and all the
other people who play that integral role.
So two different tangents.
I'll leave, I'll leave it for
you to, uh, go wherever interests
Jim Shockey: you.
Yeah, I, you know, a relationship
is based on communication and
when, and, and arguably respect
is, is the true basis of love.
When you lose respect, when you've,
you're not communicating anymore, you
take the other person for granted.
And, and therein lies a fundamental
problem with, with marriages when,
and that's just on a one-to-one level.
But the same thing goes
with our greater community.
When, when there's no
conversation, and, and I'm gonna
now flip it into urbanization.
We've urbanized over the last 60 years,
we've urbanized and, and things have come
pretty easy to the people in the city.
So it's really simple to take for
granted where their food comes from.
For, as a, for instance, you
know, farmers, ranchers, you know,
before we were, we were agrarian,
we, we were hunter gatherers.
So that food came from hunting
wildlife, and it still does
in many parts of the world.
So the, the, the people, the urban
urbanized majority have, have.
Lost respect for, for our skills.
The, the ones that provided the,
the ranchers farmers, I mean they,
you know, they'll shut down ranching
because cows, you know, make gases.
I mean, it's absurd, but, but
it, you know, what they're doing
is, that's a lack of respect.
It's all, it's all a lack of communication
and um, and ultimately it, it results in
entitlement and, and, and a separation.
And that, that's what we've had.
We, you know, the urban center,
the, and I'm not saying every single
person, cuz I'm not gonna stereotype.
We've been stereotyped.
We know what it feels like.
And, and, but, but generally they've lost
touch with what brought them to the table.
And it's only 60 years ago.
We go back 60 years ago.
Yeah, there was big centers, but the vast
majority of the people are, a majority
of the people were in the rural areas.
With chickens, with goats, with their
cows, planting their gardens, anything
access they took to the market.
So the city people and the city
people provided what they provided.
Accountants, lawyers.
Mm-hmm.
All those important things.
I'm sure there's a lot of accountants
and lawyers right now that are
throwing stones at my picture.
I'm ducking and weaving right now.
They, they're accountants and
lawyers I, they're gonna miss anyway.
Uh, that's, so it's, I, I, I,
and I'm so, I'm sorry, but you
know, I mean, I, I I love life.
You said at the beginning, passion.
Yes.
I, even, even this that we're
going through is a challenge
and it's, it's an amazing, yeah.
I mean, wow.
Look, look at what we're
going through right now.
Look at the challenge we're faced
and the accomplishment is directly
proportional to the challenge.
The greater the challenge, the
greater the accomplishment.
So when we come out of this
and, and figure it out, I'm
hoping we do, uh mm-hmm.
We, we can stand proud at that point.
Uh, going backwards to your second, Your
second point about hunters understanding
your, your buddy, the philosopher that,
you know, life is given value by death.
That's 100% true.
And, and any of us that are, are
myopically going through this world
thinking that they're a cosmic event
and it's never gonna happen to them.
It is, you know, it's,
and, and hunters know it.
We, you know, goodness sakes, if anybody
knows about life and death and under
and has a sense of an, an understanding
of how important it is, it's a hunter.
I mean, I, I've seen it over
and I've augmented death.
You know, it's, it's, it's, um, we
understand it and, you know, it, it,
it, understanding it though, and putting
it into a personal, you know, I guess
under personal relationship with it is
a different thing, you know, and, and,
uh, you know, right now in my own life,
I, you know, I'm my soulmate 39 years.
I mean, literally head over heels
and love the first date with this.
Beautiful woman and, and healthiest,
you know, dancer, yoga instructor,
never ate a deep fried anything in
her life, 66 years old and, and, um,
suddenly diagnosed with terminal cancer.
No hope.
Three months to live,
maybe nine if you do chemo.
And, you know, it's
been a year and a half.
So I'm, you know, so I am, here's me now,
me, and, you know, suddenly this life
and death that I've, I've understood my
whole life is right here, close to me.
Clo can't be closer.
Your child, my soulmate.
You know, my job was to protect
my soulmate and, and our family.
And you know, it, it's not easy.
It's not easy.
And, and I can't tell you whether, you
know, back to your point, you know,
being a hunter, we have a sense of it.
But, you know, we went to the
palliative care team the other day and.
You know, they were trying to help me.
But, but, uh, you know, I mean,
I basically said to the, you
know, there's five or six of 'em.
They're younger, so if any of
you gone through this, well, no.
Well, you've seen other people.
You've observed it, but have
you ever felt it and no.
So you're trying to help me
that's going through it right now.
That's much older than you.
That's seen death, seen life.
And I'm trying to try not
to be disrespectful cuz they
know they're doing their best.
Right.
But I don't think that what they had
to offer was going to help me because
I think as a hunter, knowing life and
death, I'm, yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm hoping
that, that we do have a, a sense of
that and that this isn't, doesn't
need to be locked up behind a door
and feared, you know, fear of death.
I have no fear of death.
I never have had a fear of death
or I wouldn't have done most of
the things I've done in my life.
It's, it's death is just part of it.
With, without that, it's again,
your, to your, to your buddy's
statement, the philosopher.
It doesn't, your, your life
doesn't have any value.
If you've taken away death as an
option, now you don't seek it.
And the whole, I I saw a thing
recently where the, there was a hunter.
I faced death.
I'm gonna, you know,
I'm not afraid of death.
I, well, no, you know, that's not right
because you, you should be following the
five rules of being a hunter, which is
safety, safety, safety, safety and safety.
Because the whole purpose of
hunting was to go bring something
back to your family to begin with,
and then your greater community,
uh, to, so that all of us survive.
So you shouldn't be seeking out death.
There's no beauty in that.
There's no romance.
There's no honor in that
at all to go seek death.
And you know, I'm gonna face death.
No, you're not.
You should be avoiding it.
You should be doing everything in
your possible power to not go there.
But when it happens, you
should never fear it.
And, and I, I don't know.
I'm in this situation right now
where, You know, and I'm, I'm trying
to look from outside in at this.
Um hmm.
It, it's gonna be, it's gonna be an
interesting, it has been an interesting
time for the last 18 months and, and I,
you know, the, the future is gonna hold
greater challenges and, and I will see,
we'll see if, you know, I consider myself
a true hunter, um, on the spiritual
side of it for field to table living
for every, you know, I've, I've u used
my life, you know, endeavoring to,
to, to be that, that hunter in every.
Way, well-rounded in every way.
And that means being a theologian.
It means being a scientist.
It, it means being an explorer.
Uh, you know, it means being an artist.
You know, these are all things that
people go off in their little worlds
and, uh, you know, never the twain
shall science and, and religion meet.
Well, you know, 500 years ago,
we were all of those things.
We were theologians, we were artists,
we were musicians, we were scientists,
explorers, we were all of it.
And, and now we've, you know, now
we don't talk because I'm this
and they're that, and we explorers
and separated from scientists.
So, and then hunters separated
from explorers and, you
know, we just dichotomized.
And so, so I, it'll be interesting to
see, back, back to your comment as I go
through this, whether it'll stand the test
of, of a, of true, the deepest challenge.
I can imagine, you know,
myself facing death, I, I.
I mean, I, like I say it
because I'm, I'm facing it.
I mean, I know you're facing it.
Everybody listen,
Travis Bader: the grand leveler of human
Jim Shockey: greatness.
Yeah.
And, and we're just ignoring it, you know?
But, but it, mm-hmm.
When you can't ignore
it, it's right there.
It, it's, it's a different thing.
And I, uh, I'll, you know, talk to me
when I've gone through this, God willing,
I, I get through it, you know, it's,
it's, uh, you know, and I know right
now it's, it's living day to day, and
then it'll be hour to hour, then it'll
be minute to minute, second to second.
I, I think I'll get through that.
It's afterwards, you know, cuz you're
starting now second to second, again, can
you get it up to living minute to minute?
Can you get it up to living hour to
hour and, and be able to live, uh,
you know, day to day in the future?
Maybe.
That's my greatest hope is just
to get day to day down the road.
But we'll see.
D does a hunter have, have a better
ability to cope with this and not fear it?
Um, I'm not saying you have to
embrace it, but you know, not fear
it not to run my life and, and
object, fear, afraid of tomorrow.
I don't know.
You know, like I say, we'll, we'll
talk again in, in, uh, in the
future and, and I'll hopefully be
able to answer those things and
Travis Bader: that's a fellow I
know he manages a funeral home and
he says something similar to that
and he says, um, you know, at the
event, after the event shortly
thereafter, there's a lot of support.
There's a lot of people there.
That's not the time that he's
really concerned about individuals
who've been affected by death.
He says it's three months later.
That's when they need their support.
That's when they need people around.
If the advice and counsel that the
palliative care people who work in
that industry was providing was kind
of not, not coming up to a level
that was, uh, of value for someone
like yourself, what sort of value?
Or what sort of advice would you give to
somebody else in a similar circumstance?
Jim Shockey: Well, you know, the same
thing I told them, and, you know, I don't
try and help me right now, you know, help
my soulmate because their, their help
was truly a deeply appreciated by Louise.
Like, and it's something I can't
give because I'm so close to her.
I mean, you know, so, so, you know, I'm
not, this isn't about me at this point.
This is about Louise and, and
this is, you know, her journey.
And I'm there a hundred percent to
supporter as they should be as well.
I don't need support.
I'm, you know, I'm, I, I don't,
it's not right now, like I say,
living day to day, um, I don't, I
don't, you know, that's not for me.
So they shouldn't use their time up.
So my advice to anybody going
through this is well, In terms
of palliative cares, absolutely.
You know, take what they have
to give, but make sure that it's
pointed in the right direction.
And maybe there's people out there that
need it themselves that are the caregiver.
Maybe they need it.
Um, you know, I, I'm well aware of my
situation and I understand life and
death, and I'm, you know, I, I'm not
faking trying to be strong or anything.
I'm not.
I just, it just is.
And I accept it.
And, and I, I've always
accepted knowing it's coming.
There's no avoiding, I'm
goodness sakes, no regrets.
So, what, what's, what's
the worry about it?
But it's my soulmate.
Um, mm-hmm.
So, so again, accept what they have
to give, and if you need it, then
certainly reach out and, and embrace
what they're, what they're giving, uh,
for, in our particular case, this is,
you know, it's for Louise afterwards,
I don't know, not never been there.
It's, it'll be uncharted territory for me.
And, and, uh, And, you know, life
is, is this amazing, amazing journey.
And it ends the same way
for every single one of us.
So if we live life and you live
till you die, why wouldn't you
be passionate about every single
day and do what you love to do?
And every single hour, if that comes
down to it, every minute, you know, every
second, just love and, and be passionate.
Uh, and, and not embrace it,
but, but don't be afraid of it.
And, and just, you know, I think
fear is a waste of emotion.
It, it, it binds you up in a
situation where you need to react.
It, it's, it's, uh, it's not a good thing.
It it, it's anticipatory.
Yeah, exactly right.
You, you know what to avoid.
You know, that's what it's telling you.
It's, but it's not something
you should never fear, fear.
I think there's somebody, I have
nothing to fear, but fear itself.
But truth, whoever said that I,
I'm, I should be able to pull
that quote out or whoever said it.
But it's, it's, it's the absolute truth.
You never fear, fear, and,
and fear is just a warning.
It's a, you know, it's spidey senses.
It's, it is.
And then that means, okay,
switch on because you're alive
right now and know you're alive.
And whatever's inside you is telling
you, uh, you may not be in the future.
And, and we, you know, although
nowadays I think we fear
discomfort more than we fear.
Fear, we just can't even
see past discomfort.
We, we we're afraid of that.
Travis Bader: So it sounds like finding
value in being of service to others is
something that, uh, Victor Frankl, the
fodder father of modern local therapy
as one of the areas that he looked
at in his bookman search for meaning.
Um, In doing my research on you.
It was interesting.
So Jesse reared it.
I had him on the podcast before.
What a great guy.
And I don't know what you have on
him, but it must be good because I
couldn't get any dirt on you from him.
Everything that was
coming outta his mouth.
I mean, it just sounded like,
uh, family sound like there's
a, a family relationship.
I'm in doing my research.
I'm looking through government records.
I've, I'm looking at
things that you've done.
Uh, you've, you speak at engagements
around the world on conservation topics.
All of the ones that I looked at,
I was surprised and not surprised.
I, I was, I, I don't know if I'd
say surprised because it, it had
confirmed a suspicion from my research.
I look in like I wonder how
much he charged for that event.
Zero.
Nothing.
You donate your time to others.
You don't donate your time to
conservation over and over again
in being of service to something
that's, that's larger than yourself.
And that's what I hear when you're talking
about this, when you're talking about
the palliative care, when you're talking
about, um, your passion in life is, seems
to be derived from living life to the
fullest and having something meaningful
and worthwhile that you're leaving
Jim Shockey: behind.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I, I mean a, a correct part of it.
I do charge
Travis Bader: not the ones that I, I
researched on the, on the, I I get that.
You would
Jim Shockey: Well, I, I do it.
Uh, you know, supply and
demand is an interesting thing.
If, if you make the, the supply so
expensive, the, the, it's funny how
the demand goes down and, and that's, I
hate saying no to someone when they ask.
And it's a good cause and I.
I would love to be able to
fly to Pennsylvania and do,
you know, do this appearance.
But I mean, it's gonna take
me two days to get there.
Um, and it's not fun, you know, I
mean, it's not, I can keep myself busy.
Um, then I'll speak at the event
and then two days to get back.
So it's five days of my life taking
a, you know, and I love the idea of
being able to, if I was next door,
I would do it 100% for nothing.
Um, I just spoke at the BC Wildlife
Federation here a couple weeks ago,
the same night we had a hospital
foundation event, um, to raise
money for our hospital, well, the
hospital foundation here locally.
So I went, drove up, spoke at the
BC Wildlife Federation, no charge,
and came back down, uh, in time to
see the auction item that Louise and
I donated for the auction, which,
which raised the most money of, uh,
Of any other auction item that night.
It was a night at the museum
for 20 people or whatever it is.
Um, you know, $5,800.
So I was there and Louisiana went there
first, and she's not feeling well.
So to her it's also important to, you
know, even though she's not feeling
well, to make the appearance for
the community, to set an example.
Um, and, and it, yeah, it, I think
it, it it for us at this point in
our lives, I mean, I worked hard my
whole life to, to get ahead, you know,
quote unquote, whatever that means.
Mm-hmm.
But we're giving it all away now.
You know, that, that's,
we can give it back.
We we're creating a foundation to give,
this museum that I'm sitting in right now
are Handman Museum, and it's a big place.
So it's 17,000 square feet.
It, it's all renovated, you know,
state-of-the-art, everything in here.
Um, we're donating the land, the
building, the contents, which is.
I don't know, millions and
millions of dollars worth of stuff.
Uh, natural history, cultural arts.
Um, and we're, you know, planning
to sell our ranch in Saskatchewan,
put all that money into an endowment
that goes into the foundation as
well to cover expenses for 40 years.
And that way it can always
be donation only at the front
entrance, which it is right now.
It has been since we opened.
I grew up in a trailer.
Wow.
So I, I've never, yeah, I could
never have come in if there was a
cover charge, but if it was donation,
I could have brought a, a tooth.
You know, I found this tooth, you
know, the curator, a pretty rock here,
iconic of Grasshopper today, you know,
and, and I would've been the curator's
nightmare, but it's donation, right?
So from, uh, here's the, here's
a quote, Carl Marks from, from
those according to their ability
to those according to their need.
And you know, he got that right.
He did on that.
He did.
You know, that's both the end of Right.
But, but he, that part was right.
You know, if we can, we should
give back to the community because
what are you gonna do, you know?
In this museum, have a giant grass sale,
sell everything and have a big pot full
of money and, and then bury yourself
with it, you know, like a feral Mm.
You know, or or worse, give it to Eva.
Oh my goodness.
Our, our daughter.
That's, yeah.
She, she would have
the most Chanel purses.
I'm throwing her outta the purse.
Blessing.
But, you know, they're,
they're doing well.
You, you, you don't do a service to
your children by giving them so much
that you take away their opportunity
to, to succeed in their own right.
And to be proud of
something that they created.
So to give I agree.
You know, we, we tend to do that.
Our generation, you know, like I
say, I grew up in a trailer park.
A conversation every night when I was
young was whether dad would get laid out,
laid off, and, and could we afford to, to
pay the mortgage when we did get a house.
Uh, you know, that, that's, I don't want
my children to have to worry about that.
So I did everything to make sure
they were protected from it.
I don't know if it's the right
thing, you know, it made me reach
and try and push to my limits.
And it, you know, made me found
a find a, a soulmate, uh, that we
were partners in that, you know, we
did this, I did this, she did that.
But together we always worked
towards that common goal.
That's something I'm very proud of.
And my wife, every day this morning,
we sat there having coffee, watching
outside, you know, the, the, the quail
and the rabbits and the squirrels.
There was deer in our field, and, you
know, we're very proud of what, what we've
accomplished because we accomplished it.
No one gave it to us.
And, and so when you give something, you
sometimes take away the A, the motivation,
and, and B, you steal the, the person's
life, you know, that child's life.
If you don't let them actually go
out there and challenge themselves,
see what they're capable of.
So, I don't know, we're,
we're giving everything away.
And that's, uh, and I speak
as much as I can for free.
But there's expenses sometimes, and
sometimes the places I speak at are, are,
uh, you know, they're doing good causes,
but they're also making good money.
And, and it's, yeah.
You know, I have to be responsible
financially, so, so I do charge, I
know there's people, wait a minute, he
charged us to speak, but I, if I can do
it for nothing, I, I do it for nothing.
You know?
I, not for nothing.
I do it because it's a good
cause and because Right.
I can, you know?
Mm-hmm.
So, cause I can, I should
and, and so I, I do my best.
It, it doesn't mean that, you
know, trust me, you know, good
from far, but far from good.
Don't look too close because, you
know, I have an ego too, and I, I have,
uh, ambitions and that takes money.
Travis Bader: Well, you know, one
of our instructors, and he is a damn
good instructor, and he says every
good instructor should have an ego.
I mean, they should care if
they're disappointing the class.
They should care if they're
not living up to a standard
that they set for themselves.
So ego is not necessarily a bad thing.
Jim Shockey: Um, I think if it's
justifiable ego, it's, it's a good thing.
I mean, that's, that's confidence.
Yeah.
Confidence is, yeah.
And, and it's perceived as ego
from someone that maybe lacks that.
But it, it's, I agree.
If, if you can back up your
accomplishments with your accomplishments,
your, your, I don't know, I don't wanna
call it arrogance, but your confidence,
you know, with actual accomplishments.
I, I, I gimme that any day over
somebody who's spouting off, but
has actually done really nothing.
I, I, I won't, I won't name names,
but I, I could probably, for the
rest of this podcast, I could come
down names not in our industry,
but, but outside of our, yeah.
Travis Bader: Yeah.
You know, it's funny how often people
who've had that struggle in their youth
go on to achieve great things in the
eyes of others as, as they get older.
And I wonder, well, I guess
there's two, two wonders in here.
Like three wonders now part of
having ADHD is your head just goes
in a million different directions.
And it was actually, it was one
of the things I looked at when I
looked through all of your hobbies.
I'm like, I wonder if it, I wonder if
you've ever, uh, been diagnosed with
adhd cuz your, your attention and your
hobbies are so diverse and so all, all in
so many different areas that it's, it's
one of the ADHD sort of, uh, factors.
Jim Shockey: Yeah.
It, but, um, adhd, I think, uh, You have
a lack of, of ability to focus long term.
I, I can set a goal for myself.
I did.
I was 10 years old when I
set the goal of this museum.
I was 10 years old when I said, when I
decided I was gonna be a novelist someday.
I started my first novel, then
started collecting for this
museum when I was 10 years old.
Um, I have no, I have no problem
focusing for decades on, on achieving
goal and just, you know, grinding
it out to the end because Yep.
You know, I, I wasn't gifted with,
you know, my wife has more talent
in, in every way in her little
finger than I have on my entire body.
But what I have is the
ability to focus for decades.
And, and if you, you know, you might
be the world's crappiest singer,
but if you keep singing your entire
life, all your competition kind of
dies off, figuratively speaking.
Mm-hmm.
And that's, you know, that's how
really I've succeeded in everything
I've done is just, you know, hard.
Just nose to the grindstone and, and,
and focused on that goal in the end.
And now I, I do have several goals.
I'll be working on this one while
I'm working on this one, and I'm, you
know, running our little empire here.
Mind you, I've got great people
now that handle everything.
You just can't do it all yourself.
And, you know, I'm standing on
their shoulders obviously, but, uh,
but yeah, I don't, I don't know.
I, I, you know, I, I don't have
a problem When I get passionate
about something I, I'm interested
in it truly, we get one life.
We get one life.
So I.
You know, I'm, I see a
grasshopper, I'm excited.
A rabbit, you know, if I'm
hunting, you know, I don't care
if it's a rabbit or a moose.
I, I'm excited about it.
And look, look, look around us music.
Holy cow.
If you looked at guitars, I
mean, in our museum, we've got a
guitar collection here, Gibson's
from the forties and fifties.
Nice.
As late as the sixties, but
they're fabulous instruments, the
sound that comes from them, you
know, I'm passionate about that.
I, I wrote a song, um, how With Me went
to number one on the iTunes blues charts.
That's why, yeah.
Back in October, 2018.
But it was because the instrument,
it was a southern jumbo, um, Gibson
from 1953, an acoustic, and I, I
mean, I strummed it once and it was
just, You're, you're inspired by that.
And I wrote the song and recorded it.
Uh, obviously I had some
session musicians and people on
our team are great musicians.
Um, and yeah, I went to number
one on the iTunes blues charts.
Well, that's the instrument inspiring.
Well, you know, that's
a passion for music.
Yes.
But it's, it's, um, it's just a joy
of allowing myself to, to look in
this world that musicians holy cow,
they get to sit there and create
beauty out of their fingers and their
brain and, and a, a work of art.
I, I, I just, I just, to even be
able to touch, like I say, there's
musicians in this room right now that
are a thousand times better than I am.
And, and, uh, and, and that's the truth.
And, but, you know, just to be passionate
about and, and love these things that
we're, we're given, it's, um, Yeah.
It, it, it, it's not d h adhd,
it's just, just a love of life.
This one life we get to live.
And I, from the very beginning,
once I was about 10, I, I intended
to live that life at 100 miles an
hour and never stray from that path
that I'd set for living this life.
And, and I say you drive for
half a century in one direction
with no, no side turns, you
know, you, you end up somewhere.
And this is where I've ended up
with my life, totally satisfied and,
and still loving the idea of, of
challenges like writing this novel.
You know, I, I wanted to do that.
So I started when I was a kid,
but I had no story to tell.
Yeah.
I, I hid the, my manuscript behind the
loose brick on our, on our, our house.
And, and I was gonna write,
be a novelist, you know?
Well, page eight.
I realized, holy cow, I don't
even hardly know how to spell.
I don't, I don't have any, you know,
we played hide and go seek today,
you know, cowboys and Indians,
whatever we played that day, it, I
really don't have a story to tell.
So I, I filed it.
I tried in 96 or 91, 91 93, I
wrote a novel called the Lord Lee.
And it was okay, you know, but
my skill wasn't good enough.
I wasn't, I hadn't honed that craft, the
right, the actual, being able to tell a
story through words on a piece of paper.
Uh, and, and so it's good,
you know, I still have it.
I never published it.
Um, why, why'd you hide it?
Travis Bader: Hmm?
Why'd you hide it behind a brick
Jim Shockey: as a child?
Yeah.
It was actually in our, in our, um, we
had a den when we finally bought a house.
It was a little 1100 square foot
house, but it had a little den
with cork floors, and it had a, it
had a real fountain in that den.
The people that originally built
a house in the early fifties.
And, and so this, but, but
the, uh, fountain didn't work.
Somebody put tadpoles in the, in the
little concrete fountain in her house.
I don't know who it was.
And they went into the, and they
plugged it up and then it rusted.
Um, but the, there was loose
bricks actually on the side of it.
And if I pulled those loose bricks and
nobody knew just me, I could pull the
bricks out and hide it in behind it.
So it wasn't outside the house.
It was inside the house in, in
these bricks on that, that, uh,
just a quick side story on that.
Um, my mom and dad, when they got a
little bit older, they sold the house.
Um, and they moved into a condominium
when they were in their late seventies.
The people that bought the house.
Just recently, someone got ahold of
me through Instagram or something,
dms message and, and said the people
across the street were tearing.
You know, or doing a renovation.
And they found one of my time
capsules that I'd put back then
with, with the important things.
And, and I've been trying to get ahold of
those people to find out if, if it was, if
I put my manuscript in that time capsule.
Cause that's how my brain worked.
Always thinking ahead, thinking ahead.
It's gonna be important.
Somebody, someone's gonna find this
and I'll be famous and I'll, you know,
they'll, that'll be so cool when they
find that I was thinking of them.
That, that, you know, how cool would
it be to find, you know, whatever
Mark Twain's time capsule he put in
a, the wall of a house when he was,
you know, when he was 10 years old.
Um, of course I didn't quite get to be
Mark Twain, but, uh, you know, I was
thinking that way when I was young.
That was my, my ambition, my, my goals
were, were lofty even at that age.
Travis Bader: Well, the, to me, the
thought of hiding the work that you were
working on inside your house, behind a
brick would suggest that it's something
that's probably deeply personal to you.
Would this.
Call me Hunter Book, be
a reflection of that.
Jim Shockey: It's, if you read Call
Me Hunter, it starts with a little boy
who's 10 years old, um, in a place.
I don't wanna give it all away, but,
um, let's just say that, you know,
to the second part of your, your
statement there, the, the call me
Hunter is based on a lot of truth.
I, I did not have to make up
very much and call me Hunter.
Uh, and what I'll tell people is that
it's 80% truth and the 20% that'll put
anybody in jail, that's all fiction.
So it'll be up to everybody,
figure out I like that.
And that, that truly is what
the, um, that's why they took
the novel of Simon and Schuster.
They, they haven't seen
anything quite like that.
I wrote in second person for parts
of it, which isn't done in a novel.
And, and, and third person, I mixed
them up and, and, uh, it, it's.
Because it's so close to the truth.
I mean, I didn't have to make it.
I, I've lived a life that I didn't
have to make a whole bunch up.
So it'll be, they, they loved it because
they couldn't tell, like they, by the
time you're reading it, you don't know if
it's well, you know, and, and even Mark
Sullivan wrote it or read it, mark, he
got one of the advanced reader copies.
Mark Sullivan, fabulous, uh, bestselling
number one bestseller twice at least on
the New York Times, uh, bestseller list.
Um, he, and, and he, he emailed
me from, uh, Dubai, I think,
or Arab and somewhere up there.
And, and, uh, he said, he said, I've
been reading it on the airplane.
He said, you've, you've, what was it?
Uh, you've captivated me something,
something to that effect.
And he said, that's
what a good novel does.
And he said, I, I put it on my cell
phone so I can keep reading it in the,
you know, for the rest of the day here.
And, and he said he, you know,
if I, if it's his quote, they,
as he was reading it, he.
It was difficult to tell what's real.
There's so much real in there
that he knows is real what isn't.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
That, that's the beauty.
But it does, does start back when I was,
or no, the character in the book, whose
name is Hunter, it starts at, um, the
age of 10 for that character in the book.
Um, yeah, so, so, you know, as far
as hiding it and, and it wasn't
close to home, I I probably hid
it because it, uh, it wasn't that
good and I didn't want anybody, my
sister, particularly, to get it.
My younger sister is a great writer,
you know, truly talented and librarian
in her life and read, has read
more novels than anybody I know.
Um, you know, I probably didn't want
it to fall in her hands and, uh, and
then be critically panned before I even
got the darn thing past page eight.
So that, that's more, more, more likely.
The reason that it was personal.
Travis Bader: So I'm, I'm
looking at the time, and I'm
very conscious of your time here.
I have a whole ton of other things
that I'd have loved to be able to,
uh, go on, but I realize you do have
other appointments you gotta be at.
I've got some stuff on your
handwritten journals, your mentorship,
you do bird watching, charitable
Jim Shockey: work.
Um, well, we'll answer 'em real quickly.
We'll, you know what, we'll
go into 'em another time too.
We can go in more in depth, but,
um, just your, your list there.
My journals, I just, my journals
from my travels in Africa
were over a million words.
Uh, a long novel is 130,000 words,
so I had over a million words, just
my, just my journals from Africa.
Um, we're going through those right now.
Uh, someday they'll be published.
I'm not sure if they'll be posthumously
or when they'll be published, but, but
they, they are being, I, I, I think
we've got it down to 180,000 words.
Ken Bailey is a dear
friend of mine and, and a.
Great writer and technician.
I mean, he's, he's my go-to guy when it
comes to cleaning up that kind of work.
Mm-hmm.
He's, he's just good at it.
Um, so yeah, my hand, those
journals are, that's just Africa.
Then there's North America and South
America, south Pacific, Europe.
I mean, they're, they're, uh, Asia.
There, there, there's a
lot of words in those.
I kept journals religiously.
Obviously I'm obsessive compulsive, maybe
not adhd, but, uh, you know, again, I
thought it would be important someday.
So, so I, I kept journals
for that purpose.
I, I've, and waiting in the wings,
I've got five books as well that
are, call Me Hunter is my most.
That's the one I really care about.
That's, uh, not Care about, but
that's the one that I need to
put out for a second poster.
Your October.
Yeah.
Um, and, and I think we, you, you
know, you can pre-order it already.
Just Google call me Hunter.
But I have, I've got four other books.
That are done, four or five, four.
Um, the one's on bear guiding
stories that, you know, just
stream of consciousness stories.
It's all done, ready for copy
edited, ready for design.
Um, there's another one, there's two
humor books that, um, if I have any
talent writing, it's probably humor.
And that's, I did that for u
under pseudonyms for a long time.
Ace Toddler.
Yeah.
There you go.
Yeah, you knew it.
Um, yeah, so those books are
ready for design as well.
They're done.
And then another one of family one
I wrote this last year, 53 stories.
Um, they're questions that I answer,
you know, as we're going through this
journey, Louise and I, over this last
year, and about her past and my past,
and even our grand, our parents and
grandparents, you know, that to tie it all
in for our kids along with photographs,
um, that's a 480 pages and it's,
it's, uh, being copy edited right now.
Um, you know, then plus my journal.
So those are all waiting
in the wings to come out.
But call me Hunter is the
most important right now.
That's the, that's the one that's looming.
Um hmm.
What was your, your second, was it poetry?
You asked Poetry.
Travis Bader: Oh, we have poetry.
We didn't talk about a U F O encounter,
brain teasers, puzzles, magic.
Um, all, all of these other things that
I've researched on here, but we, we've got
a lot of material for, um, uh, possibly
a future podcast, but I, like I say, very
conscious of the timings that you have
Jim Shockey: here.
Yeah.
Believe it or not, I'll tell you why.
I'm on a timeline today about last July.
What are we right now?
We're, we're in, um, almost June.
Um hmm.
So it's been almost a year now.
I, I was playing golf one day
and my knee hurt, so I, you know,
I go, oh, that's kind of weird.
And I always carried my clubs,
did it, you know, and, and, um,
It's my knee got swollen and sore.
I couldn't sleep.
I, uh, after a month, I
had it operated on her.
Scoped out, and I played in our, I
didn't play golf for that whole time.
Played in our golf tournament,
our club championship.
I came third, by the way,
with two braces on my knee.
Uh, and I may have been pushing
it a little bit, but it, it, um, a
week after that I started getting
all, like, just couldn't move.
I mean, there's video of me.
I, I mean, I literally
couldn't get up one step.
I, I just, every joint was like,
never felt pain like that in my life.
Um hmm.
So they stuck me on prednisone, which
is a wonder drug and a horrible, it's
a devil's candy, you know, it, it
got outta that pain but made you feel
like cropping, it's gonna kill you.
So for this last year, they've
been working on solutions and
just today is the first day that
they start a new type of infusion.
Cuz I, I still can't work my,
I can type with my fingers,
but I can't hold anything.
Can't.
Anybody shakes my hand, I just
will hit the roof, uh, shoulders.
Ooh, I can't lift my arm above there.
Uh, certainly can't, haven't
been able to golf for a year.
So it's quality of life is a little
down on the physical side, uh,
you know, pain on everything I do.
But, uh, today they're giving me
an infusion of some new wonder drug
that'll, I'm sure in 10 years they'll
find out that it makes people grow a
third eye on their forehead, whatever.
But, but that, that's
what I have to go do.
And I, I couldn't even have a, well,
I wasn't supposed to have a coffee
this morning, but I did have one.
Cuz I think they're, they probably
just don't want you to go to the
bathroom while you're sitting
there for hours getting infusion.
So, so that's what I have to do.
I mean, how pathetic is that?
I have to run up to a hospital an hour
north of here and, uh, and get stabbed
and injected with a bunch of chemicals.
So, but I mean, you know,
what the heck right?
It's just, it's all part of it, right?
It's all part the game we play.
It's, it's part of the journey.
And, and, uh, you know, it is the
price we pay for the privilege
of being this age 65 years old.
So it's.
You know, it, it's a privilege
to get to this age and, and,
you know, lucky that I got here.
Uh, actually when you look at the,
the various situations I've been
in, so, you know, if it means taking
whatever, trying, I mean, what the heck?
You know, it's just this one,
you know, 40 years knowing it's
not gonna make any difference.
Whatever is going on today.
So it it, it is just, like I
say, you just embrace life.
You get one life.
I mean, live it, live it with passion
and, and, and love to, you know, that
degree, you know, do what you love doing
and, and, uh, yeah, live with passion.
I, I couldn't, couldn't give
anybody better advice on that.
Travis Bader: Thank you so much
for being on the core Podcast.
We will have links in the bio
in YouTube for people can order
Call Me Hunter, and I really
Jim Shockey: enjoyed this conversation.
Yeah, it was my, my pleasure.
It's always fun.
I, I love a, a good podcast interviewer.
It's, it, it, it's an honor
every single time and, uh, again,
really enjoyed the podcast today.