Well I warned you I had more boring vacation stories for you, but hey, it's therapy for me so as to help me over my severe shooting withdrawal symptoms, I actually have some stiffness in the thumb joint of my right hand, and the worrying part is that I don't want it to go away, I should definitely seek help, anyway, to business.
While we were staying in our pre-inferno Cook Forest Cabin, my wife invited her friend to come over and stay for a night or two along with her two young children as her husband was away working in Ohio. After a night of bear stories and hot chocolate around the log fire, the kid's happiness was dashed when they were presented with the horrible reality of a shopping trip with "the girls" the next day, let me add at this point that Sammy is 7 while his younger sister Alex is 5.
When we arrived at the dreaded mall I made my excuses and was about to speed hot foot to my recently discovered outdoor range when I noticed Sammy's sad look of resigned boredom. I pulled his mom to one side and asked if she would consider letting me take him along, I stressed that I would stand in the way of any errant round that came our way before I would let ANY harm come to him, and to my surprise she nodded, turned to Sammy and asked him if he wanted to go with me or stand looking at ladies shoes in JC Penney for the next 2 hours.
Needless to say I now had a new range buddy. Over the next 2 hours I taught Sammy every aspect of range and handgun safety I could cram into his little head, he got 15 minutes of "lecture time" before I even let him see the S&W 22A .22LR I had stashed in the trunk, never once complaining or looking bored, I began to wonder if any of it had actually sunk in. We started by me showing him the controls on the gun and letting him gaze awestruck at a live .22 Remington round in the palm of his hand.
After fitting his eye and ear protection and getting him to give me a thumbs up before shooting, I capped off a mag just to let him see and hear the gun in action. Then his moment came, I chambered one round for him and told him to just fire it downrange towards the distant rifle racks and earth berm. CRACK, in his surprise he began to turn around with the gun while he inspected the locked back slide and empty chamber, "Hold it" I said, "just think", he thought for a second and said "sorry" and began to walk backwards (he was downrage a couple of yards and we had the place to ourselves) while pointing the gun downrange, I smiled and told him that only the gun had to point downrange and not him, he nodded and I loaded up a 10 round mag for him, he tried to load the spare and couldn't push the spring follower down more than about halfway with his thumb, by the end of the session though, he was loading them faster than me, and to full capacity.
I retrieved a 2 litre bottle of fizzy lime soda from the trunk and set it up on top of the pistol rack. Sammy hit it with maybe his 15th round, not losing heart when he emptied a full mag with no effect. When number 15 connected, he was rewarded with an exploding soda bottle with fizz shooting in all directions, he moved just an inch to turn around and stopped, he realised that he had 5 rounds and was "hot", "what do I do Mike" he asked suddenly, looking as if he was now holding an angry rattler, I told him to just expend the rounds downrange for now and check empty and safe, this he did and returned to the bench with "his" gun. Over the next hour, he shot standing, crouched and bench rested, expending both my ammo and my pricey Shoot 'N C targets.
When it came time to leave he didn't complain and it suddenly occurred to me that maybe he hadn't enjoyed it, that possibility had never entered my mind. We didn't speak at first when we drove back, I wanted the first response to be his not mine, his silence depressed me, had I failed ? I looked over at him to see him grinning from ear to ear, he was obviously deep in thought and he suddenly said, "that was the coolest thing I ever did", I had succeeded, another shooter had taken his first step, and it was because of me, I allowed myself a little pride.
When we entered the Mall he stopped the first person he saw who happened to be an old lady and said in a loud and important voice "I just shot a real gun", "well good for you" she replied and winked at me, who I assume she thought was the proud dad, well she was half right, he then insisted on being shown every rifle cartridge in Walmart but not before he had wandered right into the middle of a group of cammo jacket wearing hunters in the Sporting Goods section and announced loudly "I just fired a real gun" more smiles and winks.
The story would have ended there, except that with night falling and after we had all returned to the cabin, I removed myself onto the porch to clean and lube the .22. Sammy tailed me out and sat quietly at my feet watching as I prepared the fluids, patches and rods. With the Smith pointed towards my chest I worked a bronze brush down the bore to remove the worst of the fouling, I suddenly noticed him sit up wide eyed looking at the gun and then in turn at me, "Mike" he began a little flustered, "you must always point the muzzle of the weapon in a safe direction" - I knew that I had a winner.
Dedicated to Sammy Dietzel - American Pistol Shooter 1st Class
Specialy edited just for Dennis O.
Mike H
[This message has been edited by Mike H (edited October 03, 2000).]
While we were staying in our pre-inferno Cook Forest Cabin, my wife invited her friend to come over and stay for a night or two along with her two young children as her husband was away working in Ohio. After a night of bear stories and hot chocolate around the log fire, the kid's happiness was dashed when they were presented with the horrible reality of a shopping trip with "the girls" the next day, let me add at this point that Sammy is 7 while his younger sister Alex is 5.
When we arrived at the dreaded mall I made my excuses and was about to speed hot foot to my recently discovered outdoor range when I noticed Sammy's sad look of resigned boredom. I pulled his mom to one side and asked if she would consider letting me take him along, I stressed that I would stand in the way of any errant round that came our way before I would let ANY harm come to him, and to my surprise she nodded, turned to Sammy and asked him if he wanted to go with me or stand looking at ladies shoes in JC Penney for the next 2 hours.
Needless to say I now had a new range buddy. Over the next 2 hours I taught Sammy every aspect of range and handgun safety I could cram into his little head, he got 15 minutes of "lecture time" before I even let him see the S&W 22A .22LR I had stashed in the trunk, never once complaining or looking bored, I began to wonder if any of it had actually sunk in. We started by me showing him the controls on the gun and letting him gaze awestruck at a live .22 Remington round in the palm of his hand.
After fitting his eye and ear protection and getting him to give me a thumbs up before shooting, I capped off a mag just to let him see and hear the gun in action. Then his moment came, I chambered one round for him and told him to just fire it downrange towards the distant rifle racks and earth berm. CRACK, in his surprise he began to turn around with the gun while he inspected the locked back slide and empty chamber, "Hold it" I said, "just think", he thought for a second and said "sorry" and began to walk backwards (he was downrage a couple of yards and we had the place to ourselves) while pointing the gun downrange, I smiled and told him that only the gun had to point downrange and not him, he nodded and I loaded up a 10 round mag for him, he tried to load the spare and couldn't push the spring follower down more than about halfway with his thumb, by the end of the session though, he was loading them faster than me, and to full capacity.
I retrieved a 2 litre bottle of fizzy lime soda from the trunk and set it up on top of the pistol rack. Sammy hit it with maybe his 15th round, not losing heart when he emptied a full mag with no effect. When number 15 connected, he was rewarded with an exploding soda bottle with fizz shooting in all directions, he moved just an inch to turn around and stopped, he realised that he had 5 rounds and was "hot", "what do I do Mike" he asked suddenly, looking as if he was now holding an angry rattler, I told him to just expend the rounds downrange for now and check empty and safe, this he did and returned to the bench with "his" gun. Over the next hour, he shot standing, crouched and bench rested, expending both my ammo and my pricey Shoot 'N C targets.
When it came time to leave he didn't complain and it suddenly occurred to me that maybe he hadn't enjoyed it, that possibility had never entered my mind. We didn't speak at first when we drove back, I wanted the first response to be his not mine, his silence depressed me, had I failed ? I looked over at him to see him grinning from ear to ear, he was obviously deep in thought and he suddenly said, "that was the coolest thing I ever did", I had succeeded, another shooter had taken his first step, and it was because of me, I allowed myself a little pride.
When we entered the Mall he stopped the first person he saw who happened to be an old lady and said in a loud and important voice "I just shot a real gun", "well good for you" she replied and winked at me, who I assume she thought was the proud dad, well she was half right, he then insisted on being shown every rifle cartridge in Walmart but not before he had wandered right into the middle of a group of cammo jacket wearing hunters in the Sporting Goods section and announced loudly "I just fired a real gun" more smiles and winks.
The story would have ended there, except that with night falling and after we had all returned to the cabin, I removed myself onto the porch to clean and lube the .22. Sammy tailed me out and sat quietly at my feet watching as I prepared the fluids, patches and rods. With the Smith pointed towards my chest I worked a bronze brush down the bore to remove the worst of the fouling, I suddenly noticed him sit up wide eyed looking at the gun and then in turn at me, "Mike" he began a little flustered, "you must always point the muzzle of the weapon in a safe direction" - I knew that I had a winner.
Dedicated to Sammy Dietzel - American Pistol Shooter 1st Class
Specialy edited just for Dennis O.
Mike H
[This message has been edited by Mike H (edited October 03, 2000).]
