Ali Get Your Gun

For those who don't know, I recently got married. My husband acquired a step-dog and I, three firearms.

I am not against hunting, which is the raison d'être of these particular guns. I wouldn't by any means go hunting, but I don't disagree with the activity in principle. Nevertheless, I am a very sensitive, peace-lovin', hippie-esque type who does not like any sort of violence and who resents the role guns play in so much urban violence in this country. I don't like the idea of them being in my house. My husband isn't a big fan of the miniature schnauzer, either, but we agree to disagree.

When I announced to my husband that I was going to write a blog entry about the differences in our gun laws, he groaned. "No way. If you're going to come down on guns and gun laws, you should at least have fired one."

I had to agree. All in the name of responsible journalism, right? I was nonetheless in no hurry to do this. In fact, I tried to ignore all my husband's prodding to go shoot things out in the desert. But then I heard an ad on the radio for Shooter's World (voted 'Best place to get loaded on a Friday night' by the Phoenix New Times), where they have "Ladies' Night" on Friday nights. Here I would have free range time, free weapon rental and free safety instruction. In the name of field research, how could I pass this up?

To pacify my husband, who was disappointed I didn't want to fire his guns, I also had to agree to spend the Saturday shooting at beer bottles and skeet in the middle of the desert.

So getting back to Ladies' Night at the gun range... I had second thoughts the moment I walked in the door. All my bravado and sense of humour disappeared and I began to shake like a leaf. I was terrified, and everything was so loud! The man at the counter asked me what kind of gun I wanted. What?? How was I to know? My husband told him we wanted a 9mm. I told him I've never fired any guns, or even really seen any. I told him I was from Canada. He told me he was sorry.

One handgun and two boxes of bullets ("No Ali, they're called 'shells'") and we were on our way. At about the point where we walked into the range itself, I began to cry. This was a terrible idea! What was I thinking? I watched warily as my husband loaded the gun and shot a round at the paper target. Then it was my turn.

At this point I would like to introduce Exhibit A:
Kindly focus your attention on the lower left bull's eye. I shot 8 or 9 bullets at this thing. two hit the target, one hit off-target at the bottom left corner of the sheet, and the rest didn't even hit the paper. This was not fun. I decided to take a break.

The man from the counter came by and asked how I was doing and I told him I was very bad at this. He looked at the target. Yes, you're really bad at this, he agreed. Let me show you. Two minutes later he had me shooting consistently on target, and I think even he was impressed. Please focus your attention on the black and green dot next to the middle target. This was post-instruction. But he thought I could do better. Please now direct your attention to the small dot even further right, and to the small hole beneath it. The hole is where the target was. The dot is the size of the target. Three shots only were fired at this thing. From 15 feet.

We bought another box of ammo.

Following our evening at the range, we headed to our local "Sportsman's Warehouse," affectionately known to us as the Redneck Superstore. I bought some more bullets ("No, Ali, they're called shells") and some clay pigeons.

Bright and early Saturday morning we loaded up the truck with our mini-arsenal of weapons and enough shot to fill a small armoury and headed out to meet a friend in the desert. I thought for sure I'd be dropping the g's from my gerunds, and losing my command of adverbs. Shootin' was gonna be real good.

Turns out I'm pretty darned good at all types of shootin'. I tried my husband's .22 calibre long rifle, his 12 gauge shotgun, and his 10 gauge shotgun. I tried our friend's .243 rifle and his .40 calibre Glock handgun. I shot out targets at various distances, and actually hit the clay pigeons more often than not. Even my first time.

So it turns out I made it out of there alive. The only casualties were beer bottles, Red Bull cans and clay pigeons. These are not made from real pigeons. Not only did I have a great time, I found out I am a really good shot. (My husband is now talking with our friend about enrolling me in a gun club and competitions.) At the end of the day, though, I had grown weary of all of this, and any time I stopped to think I felt sinking in my stomach. I'm not quite sure which was more disturbing: that I had shot (many kinds of) guns, or that I had liked it, or that I was really pretty good. But I was both disturbed and exhilerated.

The guns my husband owns live under the bed. We still call them "statues," but more for the nostalgia and less for the denial. The schnauzer has yet to earn the same respect from my husband.

Where in the world is...?

I know, I have sort of just dropped off the face of the earth for the last couple of weeks. My apologies. I promise you, tomorrow's post will make the delay quite worthwhile.

To get you up to date, I finally received my first social security number, first Arizona driver's licence, and first American paying job. The latter has kept me quite busy over the last two weeks!

One step closer to full Americanhood... only a few major milestones left, including...


....!