Yawll, might want to skip over this. It's long and boring I'm sure but once I got started, I couldn't stop.
Pretty much the usual for guys my age. TV westerns and cop shows. My grandfather and uncles all hunted and fished, but I never followed them. I got into fishing pretty much on my own, when I found the creek out back of the house and could see the fish. My mother made me a pole out of a stick, some string, and a bent pin for a hook. That eventually lead to a bass boat and tournaments, but that's for another story.
My grandfather took the big three outdoor magazines of the day. Field and Stream, Outdoor Life, and Sports Afield. When he finished with them, he'd send them across the field to me to read. I would read anything back then including the back of a Corn Flake box. I read everything I could find about fishing. I knew all about fishing for Halibut off Alaska. Might come in handy down at the creek one day.
I never had much interest in hunting though. I grew up with a house full of sisters. There are four of them and only one of me. My uncle was convinced I'd grow up to be a sissy. Then one day out of boredome and having read everything about fishing, I started to read hunting stories. This was interesting. So I got interested in hunting, and through that guns. My mother came from a family of hunters, and didn't mind the idea of me having a gun. I'd had toy guns and a BB gun, and except for that one unfortunate incident where I shot my sister in the back (I swear it was an ACCIDENT! I thought I was going to die that day), I'd been pretty responsible I guess, so one Christmas Santa left a 20 ga single shot under the tree. I remember sneaking in the living room before anyone else got up and seeing that beautiful Ithaca there. I was pretty sure it wasn't for one of the girls, so I ran back to bed and counted the years until it was finally time to get up.
It's taken a long time to get here, so bear with me. My mother didn't mind shotguns. She was willing to tolerate rifles, but would weep and moan and gnash her teeth over the idea of a handgun. As someone else said, she said, "Nobody has handguns but cops and crooks. You're not a cop, and you're not going to be a crook." So no handguns.
HOWEVER. Prowling through a drawer full of old black and white photographs, I found one of my father, as a much younger man. He was leaning against a car, his foot up on the running board. He was wearing a suit, a wide tie, the jacket hung across the outside rear view mirror. He had a grin on his face that should have split his face. In each hand he held a Smith and Wesson 38. I was gun geek even then. I'd never seen a real one, but I'd seen enough pictures. Those were Smith and Wesson 38's. Where'd he get those guns? What happened to them?
I made the mistake of showing the picture to my mother. Her hair stood up and she snatched it from me. "Those are TOYS" she hissed, and I never saw that picture again. But iI never forgot it. I was also smart enought to not believe the "toys" story. I don't know about anyone elses parents, but mine would lie to me. For my own good of course.
Flash forward. My fathers funeral. New pastor who didn't know Daddy was asking for stories about him to work into the service. My mother told about the first time she saw him. He was at the local storel, sitting on the drink box (that's a water filled cooler for you young folks) in the back of the store. She said she thought he was the best looking thing she'd ever seen. She walked on home and mentioned the boy she'd seen at the store, and HER mother's hair stood up. You stay away from that (John Smith). He's a bootlegger." (an aunt has confirmed the story, and the charge). Of course that had no affect on her, and she eventually married that bootlegger. First time I'd ever heard that. AFAIK, Daddy never really drank. Maybe a beer once in a while, or a egg nog at Christmas, but that was being a pious Baptist in those days in that neighborhood.
However, I did remember two of my uncles and he, sitting around one night talking about how they used to race their cars and run from the cops "back in the day." He looked at me, winked and said "You didn't hear NONE of this boy." Yes Sir. Heck I thought they were just talking about drag racing or something. Who knew?
So Mama. Maybe you had a reason to think only cops and crooks had handguns, but so far, I've managed to avoid being either. But to the end of her life, she'd give me a discusted look if I showed up at the house wearing a handgun..."OH Why do you have THAT thing?" It's OK Mana. I still love you."
I warned you.
