A Different Kind Of Class

Do you ever get that deer in the headlights feeling? I did. Two weekends ago I showed Herman the starter rifle I had for his son, little Herman (who I will refer to as H3). Herman was excited, and so was Jen. They both want H3, and eventually all their kids, to know about guns, how to shoot them, and how to handle them safely. I'm all for that! The deer in the headlights feeling came when Herman called me up and said, "Hey! When are we going shooting this weekend?"

To be sure, I don't remember telling him that I would go shooting with him the next weekend when I showed him that rifle. I had intended to find a time when he had the kids so that we could have a leisurely day of shooting. As it was I had church commitments, the jewelry party, meeting with Lynn, the photography class, and my first serious cooking attempt all planned out. But I like to shoot, so I worked it in.

Right after the photography class I grabbed all my stuff and hightailed it for Roanoke. On the way he called and started vacillating on shooting. He wasn't sure it was worth the time or the shortness of the day due to our planned cooking (I said I'd do my cooking up there for them). We went back and forth on it for awhile, but eventually decided to proceed with the shoot as planned. When I got to their house, I offloaded all the groceries and cookware, picked up Herman and H3, and zoomed up to the range.

Herman and Jen are lucky! They've got a nice range not more than ten minutes from their house. It is called Quail Creek Shooting Range. It's a nice outdoor facility that is run by, as far as I've seen so far, nice and competent guys. We checked in and paid, and we took two rifles out to the benches and set up H3 to shoot his first real gun!

When we got out to the benches, I let Herman do all the teaching. H3 is Herman's son, and Herman is ex-Marine, so I deemed it fitting that father teach son, not father's friend. It's tradition, and what am I going to teach an ex-Marine rifleman's son about shooting? Herman knew what to teach and how to teach it. I just pulled out my lever action .22 and plinked away.

The gun I brought for H3 is a little single-shot, bolt action .22, a Crickett rifle. They are small and made for kids. It was just the right size for H3. I fired it once to show Herman and H3 how it worked (and to make sure it worked). After that it was all Herman's show. He walked his son through the basics: never point a gun at anyone, always keep the gun pointed at a safe place, down range at the range, don't play with loaded guns, make sure to follow the range officer's instructions, never shoot unless he, Herman, Jen, or myself are around. After the basic safety, Herman showed him how to hold the gun, how to load it, aim, cock it, and put the bullet on the target. It was art in motion watching father and son having their first shoot.

It's something I kinda wish my dad had done for me. My dad had, at one time, known about shooting and did some recreational shooting. But in 1965 my dad was went to Vietnam to be a forward air observer. After four months in country, in a no-kidding real-shooting war, his days of firearms were over. I can't say as I blame him for not wanting to relive that, but I also feel like I missed out on something we could have shared. More's the pity.

Herman and H3 won't have that regret, and that warms my heart! H3 took to that little rifle like it was his best friend. Before we were done, he was asking Herman, "Daddy, can I have my own gun?" The answer to that will be, "Later son, when you're a little older." H3 is only seven years old right now, but I think he will be perfectly fine with guns. I didn't see him do anything wrong or unsafe. He is a well-behaved and well-disciplined youngster who looks out for himself and his siblings. If he continues in that behavior I would have no problem getting him his own gun.

I was a little afraid I might not get that rifle back! H3 became quite adept at using it. After Herman loaded and cocked it the first time, H3 would grasp it, pull it into his shoulder, squint down the barrel, and squeeze that trigger. His first shot, naturally, was nowhere on the paper. That's ok! It will come with time. It didn't take long before H3 was pulling that bolt open, putting the next round in, and closing that bolt all by himself, and quite well, too. The only thing he had trouble with was cocking the rifle. The Crickett is manually cocked by pulling back on the cocking piece, and it takes some effort to do it. H3 was able to do it about half the time. The other half Herman would pull it back for him. Eventually he was able to put together a respectable group at seven yards (hey! we started out slow!).

The target I was shooting at had nice, ragged holes at the center of my targets, plus one hole dead center for my last round. (I was shooting kneeling with the rifle on the bench). Not quite a hard feet to accomplish, but I had lots of fun. We took the targets down. H3's will get framed at some point. When we got back to the house we, of course, showed Jen my target with the nice, tight groups, and told her it was H3's. Then we showed her H3's and told her it was mine. She didn't buy it--she always knows when Herman and I are full of it. Not that it matters anyway. She was just as happy as we were.

All in all it was mission accomplished on several fronts. We had fun. We taught another kid how to shoot. And we strengthened a bond between father and son. Pretty good for an afternoon's work!

Alone

Fair warning! I'm going to post something that is going to sound whiny and complainy. Proceed at your own risk.

This week has been one of those weeks that just isolates me. I haven't really heard anything from friends. Work has been trying. Things haven't been going my way. All I've been doing is going to work late, getting home late, sleeping late, dodging housework, and watching TV. I've had no social life whatsoever--going to work second shift just kills any chance of that. I was hoping that the weekend would be looking up, but that may not be in the cards.

I have two tickets to the Fort Worth Symphony tomorrow night. I don't have a date or anyone else to go with. My cousin is busy, and my two friends from Roanoke haven't got back to me to tell me one way or the other if they want to go. Because I have a subscription I can move my tickets around, but I have to do it before show time, which means that I have to call the box office and tell them what I intend to with my tickets if I don't use them. Do I want to go to the symphony alone? Not really, but I don't want to waste my tickets, either, and at this point it looks like I'll be the only one using them.

Saturday there's a Pampered Chef party being thrown by Herman and Jen, my Roanoke friends. At least I hope they're still my friends. The last time I hang out with them was three weeks ago. Since then whenever I've emailed or messaged them, they haven't gotten back to me. I've been going over things in my mind, trying to think if I've done something to make them upset at me. I can think of two things. When we went shooting, I met a guy and ogled his .22 for a few minutes, leaving H and J by themselves. Last week I made a comment on Facebook on one of their friends' posts that could have been taken the wrong way. Or they may just be busy, I don't know. All I do know is that they haven't contacted me, so I'm a bit apprehensive about going to see them.

I don't even know what I'll do Sunday. Yizong will be at Ridgles, and I don't really relish going to TCC alone. I prefer to know my enemy before I engage him. Right now I don't know what the political situation is like. I don't know what the groups are, or the ministries, or the needs, or the wants, or anything. As I said in a previous post, all I did was change my paperwork from a hostile church to an indifferent one (at least towards me). I don't think I want to go.

Therein lies my real problem. I don't have any friends to do anything with. H and J are not the church-going type. Truth be told, I don't have any friends who do go to church. Yizong is a minister by trade, and while he's my friend, he's also on duty when he's in church. He can be friendly, yes, but he can't really be my buddy.

So this weekend, it looks like I'm going to be isolated yet again. This sucks!

Temporarily Not Single

Yesterday I had planned to try to not be home as much as possible this weekend, but it's been a hard week, and I wasn't really in the mood to play games, so instead I just did the responsible host/homeowner routine today. I slept in way late due to the second shift madness and got up about an hour and a half before we were to meet my uncle and his family for lunch.

That lunch took a lot longer than I thought. We showed up at the restaurant at noon and didn't leave until nearly 3:30pm! The usual thing happened: My parents talked with my aunt and uncle while I talked with my cousin who is one year older than me (more or less). My uncle's family friend was also there, and she split her time about half and half in the conversations.

Heather, my cousin, and I talked about school, high school, the reunion I just got back from, church, TV, and anything else we could think of. It's nice to have that type of person who you can just talk to without having to do any kind of mental filtering. Both my and her parents embarrass us to some extent, and we were corralling them to a certain degree, but, with one exception, lunch went incredibly smooth (a nice change from the norm).

After lunch we all split up. Mother thought I was going home with them, but the fact that I drove my own vehicle and had told her numerous times I had other things to do along didn't seem to register with her. I checked my clock and noticed that the Pampered Chef party I had planned to go to was already over, except that it wasn't today! It's two weeks from today! (Thank God for iPhones and Facebook.) My afternoon having become uncomplicated I escaped to Academy Sports to talk to their golf guys for awhile (yes, I'm starting a new hobby, God help me!) and then came home while mother was asleep.

At home I finally hauled out the new fence slats and nails and repaired the fence between my house and the vacant house next door. (That's a long story for another time and another blog.) That work done I just hung around with my dad until mother woke up and started stirring the pot again. Dad and I have an adult-to-adult relationship where mother still treats me like I'm ten years old. So far it's been an amicable weekend with me copying daddy's CDs (he has great taste in music [or he's cloned it on me, whichever]) and getting the house in a little order.

Tomorrow may be a little more contentious as there is nothing to do but go to separate churches. Mother wants to go to "my church." Except that I don't have a church any more. So naturally she says that we'll all go to First Baptist Arlington. My response? Not a chance in Hell! This project is my own undertaking with my own goals. I honestly don't need mother interfering with it. Will I go to FBC Arlington? Maybe, but definitely by myself.

Back in Arlington, Wishing I WAS Alone

Ok, there are times that I do want to be alone. Or at least away from certain people. I had a good time at Trinity's high school reunion this weekend, but I was staying at the parental units' house. I love the parental units, but there is a reason I moved out--I value my space. This weekend mother has to come down for some medical tests, and, that's right, you guessed it, they're staying with me. Guess I won't have a weekend this time around.

Family Reunion and Weekend Wrap Up

Ok, last official day of the weekend, and it was as busy as each day during this little sojourn to Lubbock. First, I didn't go to church. I thought about it and even looked up a few to see if I could find a church that advertised a singles group, but I couldn't quickly find a website with the desired info, and combined with the fluctuating schedule, I decided to just pack in the church thing until next weekend.

Mother's family reunion was this Sunday, and I wasn't looking forward to it at all. But I went anyway, if for nothing else just to make a token appearance and reset the counter on years absent. I must say I was surprised by what I found. My cousin from Oregon that had a family emergency ended up losing her husband last night, so my sympathies go out to her. My cousins from Maryland were there, and it's always nice to talk to them. But over and above that, there were some pretty cute girls wandering about the room. Too bad they're all family, even if I don't know them. Long story short I grabbed a plate, had lunch, and sat with the Marylanders and talked with them until I had to punch out and get things together to go back to the metromess.

Before I could do that, I had to make a stop at the house of the parents of my friend Casey. They wanted to see both me and our other friend from Allen, but she punched out yesterday, so I was all there was. C and I went by and talked for about a half hour until I returned to the parental units' house and packed my gear to go back to Arlington.

Packing wasn't as big a deal this time as Thursday, but I think that's because I was less hurried and it wasn't as hot. I got all my junk in and, after a couple of errands, I hit the road and made it back to Arlington. Right now I'm trying to get all my stuff sorted from the weekend and get pictures posted. Tomorrow I still have off, so I might just veg.