Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Hey, what's that? Shoot it!

Dad and Kris were in the back yard shooting clay pigeons. They used a shotgun or a 22 or something—my knowledge of these things does not run deep. Whatever the weapon of choice was, I was intrigued.

I watched from my window as Kris loaded yellow pigeons into the red, ‘c’ shaped launcher and flung them through the air. Dad waited, gun pointing up at the sky, butt or handle—or whatever the back end is called—resting against his shoulder. He cocked his head to the side, squinted his eye, and squeezed the trigger.

Pow.

The clay disc broke into a hundred little pieces and fell to the ground.

Leaning closer to the window, I tried to memorize everything they did—from the way they loaded the ridiculously named pigeons to how they held the gun. Deep within I felt a great disturbance building. It churned and spread to my extremities like a rumbling earthquake.

I could shoot clay pigeons. I could do it better than them. I wouldn’t miss.

Throwing on some clothes, I zipped through the family room, passing Mom by in a whirlwind.

“Where are you going?” she asked.

I stopped in the kitchen. “I’m gonna go shoot with Kris and Dad,” I said, tapping my foot. She was holding me up.

Mom laughed and waved her hand and I darted through the back door.

“Hey, can I try?” I asked, startling my gun toting family members.

Dad gave me a look that said I’d done something wrong.

“What?”

“Don’t scare people holding guns,” he scolded, then his face softened and he looked at me with a big smile. “Are you sure you want to try?”

“Yep, I’ve been watching from the window.”

Kris laughed and showed me the pigeons and how to load and launch them, but I wasn’t interested; I wanted to hold the gun. “Can I shoot now?”

Standing behind me, Dad held the handle—or whatever—against my shoulder, told me how to use the sight and pull the trigger. I was golden.

“Ready?” Kris asked.

“Go,” I said, shaking from head to toe.

The pigeon soared through the air. I lined my eye with the sight, squeezed the trigger and Pow, I flew back on my ass. The target still broke into a hundred pieces, but not because my bullet connected with it, no, the clay broke when it smacked the ground.

Dad and Kris bent over in hysterics. I cried. My shoulder hurt so bad, as did my pride—and worse my butt!

Running inside, I swore I’d never touch another gun for as long as I lived, but that promise was broken a couple years ago when my husband bought . . . ummm . . . errr . . . a 9mm. So far I’ve avoided shooting it, but I’m sure one of these days my competitive spirit will take over and I’ll challenge him to target practice—at the range.

11 comments:

  1. what a great picture you painted! I could picture the whole thing. great writing!

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  2. That is an awesome story, Krystal! And I'm with Alexx ... I could totally visualize the younger you doing that.

    I still haven't fired off a gun ever; shot a lot of bows and arrows but never a gun.

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  3. Ever see Mr. Mom? That's what you reminded me of when I read this. "what did you use a 22? Yeah, 22, 23 whatever it takes"

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  4. No, I've never seen Mr. Mom, but that's about the extent of my knowledge of guns!

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  5. Fun story, Krystal...but this kind of tale is so foreign to me -- never held a gun. Never even seen one. Maybe I *AM* Mr. Mom.

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  6. Anonymous8/30/2011

    As always, you weaved a wonderfully colorful and lifelike picture for us, Krystal! So much so that we were right there next to you, falling on our butts too! Thanks for the laugh this morning! :-)

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  7. I can just see you all small with a big gun, wishing to shoot way above your size, and then landing on your butt! Bet you did it in style!!! Loved this post:)

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  8. Great imagery! For me, shooting was always great fun. I carried a rifle and a handgun for my previous job, and miss it!

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  9. Wonderful reminiscence, splendidly described -- as always! :-)

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  10. hahahahah brill! I can't cound the amount of times I have thought I could do something much better than others only to be sadly mistaken. Great story, really enjoyed that.

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  11. That is so funny. Like Louise, I could almost picture you being small trying to handle that big gun. Maybe they should have started you with something simple, like a Bee-Bee gun :)

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