Apr
21
April 21, 2007
I hope you don’t think I’m kissing your ass, but can I just say what a fascinating, intelligent, well-mannered discussion has been going on, and how pleased I continue to be that I can share my thoughts with you without fearing a Big Bunch of Crazy in response? I think you might just be the smartest, sanest bunch of readers a blogger could ever hope to have, and also I think you look really hot in those jeans.
JB and I have been talking quite a bit about guns and legislature and education over the last couple days as we’ve been reading the comments people are posting and the complex issues they raise. We learned that while we come from somewhat different places with our regard to firearms, neither of us want Riley to have toy guns. I don’t know how you can teach a child about gun safety and the proper way to handle a gun, then allow them to carry realistic plastic versions which are treated as harmless toys, surely undoing learned behaviors such as “never point a gun at anything you don’t intend to kill”—never mind the possibility of someone mistaking it for a real gun. On a related note I also have major reservations about games like Halo where the whole point is aiming and firing pretend weapons at other people, but then again I have reservations about video games in general and aarrgh, that is a whole additional can of poisonous snakes.
I’ve been wondering whether as gun owners we need to disclose that fact to any new playmate’s parents. It’s something I hadn’t really thought of before, but I understand that people often want to be informed if guns are in the house. We would want to know, too—so we could feel confident in the safety measures that are in place. Do you think the responsibility to bring up the topic should lie with the interested party, or should it be proactively volunteered?
Oh, what a subject. Anyone mind if I switch gears? Let’s all make believe there is some kind of clever segue in this paragraph that takes us from guns to jogging.
I’ve been thinking about long-term fitness goals and ways to make exercise a lifelong routine. I’m still into Turbo Jam and doing the workouts several times a week, but I’d like to, you know, diversify. Getting to the gym is a lot more challenging than it used to be, so I figured running was my best option.
On Friday morning I set the alarm for 6:45, got my ass out of bed and hit the street. The morning was cold and clear and lovely, and the roads were quiet. I ran past cherry trees in full bloom and heard the twinkling chatter of songbirds.
The only bad part was that it sucked, oh god did it suck, it sucked hyena rectum, it sucked from the moment I stepped out the door and it sucked for the whole entire fifteen minutes I forced myself to spend alternating between an anemic jog and a gasping, wheezing walk.
My entire body hated me and my lungs threatened to burst like airbags from my flared, desperate nostrils. It was chilly and the insides of my ears got cold and it made my head hurt. I felt like my feet each weighed half a ton and my knees were made out of concrete. The only thing that was legitimately running was my nose, because at my pace I could have been overtake by a banana slug, or possibly a large glacier. It SUCKED.
It will suck less if I keep trying, though . . . right? Or is the reason joggers always look all intense and shit because they’re trying to hang on to their will to live? Any encouraging advice is more than welcome.
Lastly, it seems like it’s been at least a couple days since I’ve inundated this site with photos, so hey. Ho. Let’s go:
Here is the boy and Cat, while in the background I am squawking “Pet the kitty nice! Pet the kitty NICE!” over and over like a deranged parrot.
Riley at the farm, probably wondering why I’m always pointing a camera at him like he’s Britney Goddamn Spears.
Hmm, what’s going on here? Pooping, maybe?
Riley’s t-shirt is much cuter than mine. But my shirt doesn’t have drool marks, so there.
Adorable father-son moment, or dueling lamprey eels? Choose your own adventure!
I love this photo because of his oh-so-familiar expression. My suspicous little boy.
Apr
19
April 19, 2007
My husband and I are gun owners. More accurately, JB is a gun owner, but one year he gave me a Ladysmith Smith & Wesson .38 Special, a revolver with gleaming grips that’s strong enough to kill a man, but sized for a woman. So I suppose I am a gun owner too.
JB was raised in a pro-gun environment. His father is a hunter, a target shooting enthusiast, and a collector of firearms; JB and his brother share many of the same interests. Target practice used to be one of JB’s favorite hobbies, especially when we lived in Las Vegas near a large range. These days he only uses guns in Oregon, when we’re visiting his family in Coos Bay and the menfolk go out to target shoot. He joins his family once a year in the fall to elk hunt, too.
Before I met JB I’d never seen a gun in real life. Now I’ve not only seen plenty of firearms, I’ve shot quite a few, from pistols to shotguns to high-powered rifles. I used to be a pretty good shot with a Mini-14, which is the sort of Big Scary Gun you see in movies depicting dramatic bank robberies.
I went shooting with JB because it was something he enjoyed and I had no particular reservations about interacting with guns (although I had a very strong emotional reaction the first time I pulled the trigger, it was overwhelming and terrifying to understand the destructive power I held in my hand). Several years ago we shot together quite a bit, and since then the opportunities to do so—and the interest, I suppose—have dwindled. I don’t think I’ve fired a gun for at least a couple of years.
Politically I am not in the same camp as JB, who believes very strongly in the right to bear arms. It’s a gray area for me. I don’t necessarily believe that gun ownership should be outlawed. I do believe it should be strongly regulated, and that, for instance, people who are forcibly admitted to mental hospitals shouldn’t be able to buy Glocks.
JB’s feeling is that if someone in one of those Virginia Tech classrooms had been armed, the shooter could have been brought down before so much damage happened. Which isn’t to say he believes students should be carrying weapons to their classes (but maybe teachers should have the option?). As he said to me, he doesn’t have all the answers to these difficult issues, he just believes Americans need to have the right to defend themselves against their fellow man. That if guns were outlawed, criminals would still get their hands on them; that citizens should not be rendered defenseless in criminal circumstances.
His opinions are more complicated than what I’m presenting here, I only mean to show his general stance.
It’s very hard to be objective about guns when they’re being used in schools to end young lives. I’ve found that since Riley was born I feel differently about guns in general; they seem uglier, their purpose a sad statement about our society. I wish, simply, that they didn’t exist.
There doesn’t seem to be a “make unhappen” weaponry vote available to me, though, and so I have to consider the realities of a world with guns. Where Riley will grow up with events like Virginia Tech that must be explained to him, a father who would like him to be exposed to firearms the same way he was—with integrity and a never-wavering focus on safety—and a mother who futilely hopes her boy spends his life oblivious to their existence.
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