Bust ya' guns I excersised my 2nd Amendment right today by heading over my local firing range and bearing arms. A friend of mine here in the department invited me to go last week, after mentioning he'd bought a gun. At first I didn't think he was serious: they were going to let me, a guy who's never even seen a gun, let alone shot one, handle a firearm?!?! This is so American how could I say no? We decided to head out on Sunday, partly because that was when both of us were free, but a part of me felt the Day of the Lord was most appropriate for such an activity.When we first walked in this morning I was pretty scared, silently questioning why I said yes. Before you try something new, it's always natural to ask yourself, "what's the worst that could happen?" In this case you could die; for some reason this realisation didn't hit me until I was in front of the counter and the guy was going over basic safety with me. To be honest, I haven't been as scared as I was this morning since the time I partcipated in attack dog training. But alas, I was here to shoot and I wasn't leaving till I put some holes up in something. The range looked just like the police shooting halls in the movies. Everyone had their own stall, and there's the string mechanism to adjust the location of the paper target. At first, the sound of the gunfire was a bit disconcerting. I think for the first 10 minutes or so I was jumping all over the place. When we first got out there we got up to our stall and my friend showed me the basics of handling a weapon (loading, unloading, holding, etc.). I payed as best attention as I could with random gunfire happening all around me - talk about pressure. I stepped back and watched as he popped off a couple rounds to show me how it was done. I don't think I'll ever forget the feeling I had watching him shoot the weapon for the first time. It's hard to describe. Sort of an astonishment at the destructive power of the thing and the fact that there are so many people out there that love this stuff. But I didn't have time to sit and philosophize about the whole thing: regradless of how wrong the whole thing felt, there was no turning back now, it was soon my turn to shoot. I loaded up the weapon, braced myself and gently squeezed the trigger. There was a huge POP, followed by a small explosion, and that was it. I felt kind of uneasy: I realised then that for me, shooting was going to be an aquired taste. For the next hour or so we took turns lockin' and loadin'. After my initial fear and unease went away, I was able to concentrate on hitting the target and staying steady. It was a fun time, one that won't be soon forgotten.
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