I'm a shooter

Yes, you read that title correctly. I suppose this post comes as a response to a college friend asking me if the National Ammo Day post was a joke. Clearly not.

I shoot.

Guns.

The picture above is taken from the mfg's website and is the current top of my lust list. In 10mm.

As long as I can remember, I've been a shooter. BB guns (nobody got their eye put out!), .177 caliber air rifles and .22LR's were the standard of the day. My first experience with anything of significant power was when I was 10 yrs old. My father, an uncle or twenty and my great-grandfather were at my great-grandparents' house in the country and they were going to do some shooting. Perfectly normal, common activity in the South, in that area, and especially in my family.

I was a scrawny kid. When I graduated high school I weighed 150-ish soaking wet and was 6'2" so you can imagine what I was at the ripe old age of ten. Split rail skinny.

My family is the typical Southern family. They are gentle and kindhearted, but mischievous as the day is long. My great-grandfather probably passed that trait down through his DNA, because he always seemed to have a $h!t-eating grin on his face every time I saw him. He developed a love for the outdoors, hunting, Red Setters, horses, family and fun in nearly all of his kids, grandkids, and greats. I was the last of the great-grandkids he taught to shoot.

The guns for the afternoon were the typical ones in the family. It was early Fall, before Thanksgiving and the opening of quail season. That meant shotguns needed to be put through their paces to make certain they were still in good working order after spending the Summer in their cases and stories needed to be told about past hunts. I learned that even in his 70's my great-grandfather could drag himself and several others all over his little corner of Laurens County after quail, covering an easy 10-12 miles during the day. We stopped seldom for food or drink. If we were hungry, we quickly learned to bring our own snacks in our coat pockets and there were always plenty of water sources close by until we could make our way to Tab's for an RC and a Moon Pie or a Pepsi with peanuts dropped in it - no! I'm not making that part up.

My Dad's shotgun of choice was a J.C. Higgins 12 gauge bolt-action 28" barreled monstrosity that had a full choke. Being that it was my Father's, I had to shoot that one. Remember, split-rail skinny.

My great-grandfather suggested I aim for a cluster of pine cones up in the top of one of the trees and see if I could hit them. Actually, he suggested I take the one on the left out and leave the other two intact. I think I looked at him in utter awe thinking if he really wanted me to do that, then by gosh that's what I was gonna do!

Needless to say, I nearly had to pick myself up off the ground and I found out why he always told me to stay out from behind his red stallion. I thought I had been kicked by a horse!

The first word I remember hearing from him was not, "Are you OK?"

It was, "Well, $h!t! He hit the one on the left! The other two are still there".

I started saving that day for my very own shotgun and bought a 20-gauge single shot the following Spring. It and my father's bolt-action mechanical horse-hoof reside under my roof today.