“You’re just a clown! What do you know about guns? Hahaha!”…
Let me start by saying that I grew up with guns. My grandfather was a cowboy...a real live cowboy out in Oregon. He would ride around on horseback, herding cows and sheep and shooting coyotes whenever he would see them. He knew the habits of coyotes so well they used to hire him to ride around in a helicopter and show them where those little devils would hide. I idolized him.
When I was 12, I was a Boy Scout and went to Camp Barstow near Columbia, SC. I tied with one other kid with the highest award for marksmanship. We shot bolt action .22 rifles at paper targets, standing, kneeling, and prone. We had a great instructor. He drove home the point that every single bullet was potentially a life, every shot could take a life. We counted our bullets before each practice and recounted the empty shells. Rifles were to always be pointed down range, never any other direction. The bolt action opened when we were not in the process of shooting. We did breathing exercises...10 slow breaths...listen to your heartbeat...after 10 breaths, hold your breath, aim, and very gently squeeze the trigger, trying to time the shot in between heartbeats.
My mom was so proud when I won that award! My dad died 3 months before I was born, so mom always tried to make sure I had some kind of proper male role model to guide me. The shooting instructor was one of the first. Teachers and sports coaches would follow in later years.
Anyway, the point is that when I learned to shoot, I had a good instructor and it was life or death serious business. When my granddad died, my mom brought his guns back from Oregon to our house, a .22, a 30.06, and one other I forgot. He had a German Luger, taken from a German officer in WWII, that was given to him, but that pistol went to his best friend who was a rancher.
The 30.06 was my granddad’s favorite. I thought about him every time I held it. We’d look around the neighborhood for an old TV somebody was throwing out, we’d take that old TV and carry it out to the dump/sand berm place in Lugoff, SC and we’d shoot out the screen. We didn’t have any money, so 5 to 7 bullets was an entire afternoon’s entertainment. Every shot was the world! I taught my brothers what I had learned at camp. I was the big shot at shooting! Hahaha!
Mom also introduced me to a guy named Fletcher Williams. Target shooting was his thing. He had a .22 with a really heavy thick barrel, like a solid pipe, much thicker than the barrels on any gun I’d ever seen. He told me all about how target shooters work...leather gloves...sandbags...the breathing thing...and how you’d shoot 10 bullets through exactly the same hole, etc. He apparently had some kind of World Record or World Championship for shooting. I guess mom wanted me to follow his footsteps, but I had discovered juggling and Steve Martin, so I didn’t take the hint.
Guns kind of went away for several years...I went deer hunting a few times...never shot because it was never a clear shot...it was probably my 9th or 10th time before I actually shot a deer. I took two shots and killed two deer in back to back hunting sessions. I found I really enjoyed the waiting part better than the actual killing part. Sneaking into the stand before light...trying to be absolutely still...listening to the forest wake up...maybe a bird flies right by your head and you hear the whoosh sound of the wings...the different calls of the different birds as they wake up...and the smell of the pine trees and the quiet...nothing better! It’s like nature’s circus!
Life goes on. I joined the circus, went to Japan to work for a Japanese circus, back to America...then Columbine happens. I had some family in Littleton, CO. What a horrible thing! I remember the McDonalds shooting in California, but I still believed these things are a one off, sad and tragic, but infrequent and unpredictable. I’m so busy with the circus and working on my clowning, that there’s no space for other thoughts in my brain.
Then VA Tech happens. I saw that live coverage...those old stone buildings, so beautiful in the snow...and all that horror! I found out my cousin’s kid was there, on that same floor where the counselor was shot, that was her counselor! “How does this happen?” I thought. The news reports said the kid was know to have mental illness struggles. How does he buy a gun?
Then Sandy Hook happens...the shooting happened at same time I was doing an anti-bullying school show for elementary kids on Camp Lejuene. We did two shows. The teachers wanted to take pictures with every class after the show. They seemed so kind. As we left, we saw Marines walking up to the school, in full uniform, coming to pick up their kids. I thought “Man, those Marines really love their kids!” I had no idea. We hadn’t heard any news because we had to get ready for the show, but everybody else knew what happened. All I knew was there was this strange energy everywhere, something was different. To be a good clown, you have to be sensitive to your surroundings. You’re always adjusting your energy level to fit the mood of the audience, so you watch people closely. My alarm bells went off as we saw those Marine parents hustling to get their kids after school. “Must be some kind of early dismissal” I thought. “Something’s going on”. It wasn’t until we got out on the highway and I tuned in to NPR that I found out what had happened in Newtown…
(to be continued in part 2) (any advice about how often people publish, how much is too much, how much is too little, etc. is appreciated. I’m new at this and unlike in clowning, I can’t see the readers/audience and their immediate reactions.)