In ramshackle hunting cabins and suburban homes across the state, the lights will go on a little bit earlier this morning.

The woodstove will be stoked, breakfast prepared and gobbled down, and last-minute mental checklists consulted … all long before sunup.

If you’re a Maine deer hunter, this is your day. Opening day. And from now until the end of November, you’ll greet many of your co-workers and buddies with the same simple phrase your father and grandfather used before you.

Got your deer yet?

By the end of the month, about 30,000 of us will be able to answer that question in the affirmative.

Until then, we’ll all be stalking … sitting … hoping. We’ll scan the underbrush for the tell-tale outline of a big buck’s antlers or begin yet another snowy track, hoping to cross paths with the brown behemoth before he catches wind of us.

We’ll grunt and bleat and rattle. Or we’ll sit as quietly as possible, waiting … waiting … waiting.

And wondering.

Have I made a mistake? Is that crackling of twigs the one, the monster deer I saw last year? Should I stand up and move? Should I stay put?

By the end of November, we’ll have answers to all those questions … and more.

Like this one: Why do you rise each morning at 4 a.m., leave a warm bed behind, and spend hour after hour after hour in the woods?

If you’re one of those who makes that choice, and wouldn’t miss it for the world, you already know part of the answer.

But by the end of November, you’ll know a bit more.

That’s the way it works, you see.

The more we hunt, the more we want to hunt. The more we see, the more we know. The more time we spend alone in the woods, the more special it is when we return, belly up to the kitchen table in front of a crackling fire, and share the experience with others.

We may get our deer this year, you and I. We may indeed.

But if we don’t?

Talk to us at the end of November, and I’m sure we’ll tell you that all the waiting and walking and sitting was well-spent.

That filling a tag isn’t a necessary part of the hunting experience.

That we still ended up with a season’s worth of memories, and a slew of stories we’ll share around deer camp fires for years.

Today is your day. My day. Our day. It’s Opening Day.

Good luck. Be safe. Have fun.

Maine deer, by the numbers

The Maine Department of Inland Fisheries & Wildlife has compiled a list of tidbits and trivia that hunters and non-hunters alike may find interesting. Among those facts:

. Maine’s wintering deer herd was estimated at 259,000 in 2005.

. In 2004, 87 percent of the state’s deer harvest was taken during the four-week firearms season. Of the 30,926 deer killed by hunters last year, just 1,537 were taken during the expanded archery season and 547 during the regular archery season. Another 1,239 were shot during the muzzleloading season. Residents killed 88 percent of the deer shot statewide.

. In the past 10 years, there has not been a single reported incidence of a nonhunting person being injured by someone deer hunting.

John Holyoke can be reached at jholyoke@bangordailynews.net or by calling 990-8214 or 1-800-310-8600.