Wrestled With Myself?
Are there any other folks out there who have wrestled with the decision to arm themselves?
Not really.
There were a couple of factors that kept me disarmed for so many years.
I had done my military time and, on getting out, I figured the whole "armed defense" thing was someone else's job.
I went on to do several years of volunteer work in Europe.
When I came back, I had cross-trained into the brand new high tech sector and found myself mostly sitting at a desk.
I met and got to know a few people who had guns, some of them hunters, some of them shooters, and a couple just plain strange.
I had never really familiarized myself with firearms, and I wasn't comfortable around them or the people who had them.
On the one hand, I could have gotten familiar, but that would have required two things: 1) an admission that I didn't know spit, and 2) something resembling work to actually learn about them.
So, here I was, nervous around gunnies, unwilling to admit I had something to learn, and unwilling to work at it.
I guess you could say I was an ignorant lazy coward on the subject. And I guess I'd have a hard time arguing it with you.
Came the day, though, that I realized I needed to learn more, as I was moving to a place where people hunted and sport shooting was common.
I went to gun shops and asked questions.
"Hi there. I'm Garry. You guys got time for some dumb questions?"
I got a .22 rifle. A friend of ours gave me a snub-nosed .38 calibre revolver. I was good with the rifle, terrible with the pistol.
I kept asking dumb questions. I added another rifle, then a pistol, and so on. I practiced.
One day, as I was timidly feeling my way toward enlightenment, we had a "parade" in our town. Several hundred angry Mexican "youths" carrying a huge Mexican flag, right by our front door. Fists in the air. Shouting slogans I didn't understand. No smiles.
I was completely not prepared to deal with a "random social event" on any scale at all. My wife and I had a moment of illumination, and set about becoming more prepared for [whatever].
Why? 'Cuz you just never know.
Did my politics have anything to do with it? Not really.
I was never a particularly good Democrat. Ross Perot's thing didn't work. And I was never a particularly good Republican.
Know why?
'Cuz none of them ever cared what I thought. They never asked. They would show up with some kind of platform that had been decided on by a group of good ol' boys of some stripe in a smoke-filled room to which I'd not been invited.
The platform was always presented as "received wisdom" and we were expected to endorse it.
Kinda came down to choosing which group would run my life according to whichever set of rules I found more acceptable -- or found less objectionable.
Nah. Politics didn't have anything to do with my decision to be armed.
Waking up from years as an ignorant, lazy, timid dweeb was what did it.
I still don't care for politics.
I still won't vote for someone whom I believe means to disarm me.
Welcome to The High Road.