Pea Shooters and Other Boy's Toys

One of the common things to hear around my place is a woman saying, "Boys and their toys." "Toys" is used under a broad definition to describe any of our pieces of equipment we enjoy using. This may be our F-350 truck or our pipe-cutting thingy-ma-bobber. I figured today was a good time to chat about some of the more noisy...and lethal...of our toys.

Men seem to be born with a fixation on weapons of mass destruction. By age five every boy has discovered his personal arsenal of imaginary fire arms and explosive - generally including: two handguns, three to ten different audio simulations of various bombs and machine guns, and a few more unique ways of killing and maiming imaginary foes. There are, however, those who wish to prevent us from our forms of self expression. They believe by removing our tools of cap guns, video games, and camouflauge clothing, they'll prevent us from imagining epic heroism. But as all mothers eventually find out, boys will be boys.

There comes a day, though, when imagination is replaced somewhat by reality. One day, you discover how to create a pea shooter...and your sister discovers how much a little pea can hurt...you then discover for the umpteenth time how much a wooden spoon can hurt. By your tenth birthday, your parents are so worn down that, contrary to better judgment, they buy you a BB gun. With strict orders to only shoot at targets mounted on a hay bale, you discover how boring this is...and discover for the umpteenth and second time how much a wooden spoon can hurt.

Finally, around age twelve, after much whining, begging, complaining, pleading, and possibly even some extra chores, comes the first "real" gun. Insert drum role The Twenty-Two! What is soon discovered about a twenty-two though is that it's truly a "useless" gun. A "useless" gun is powerful enough to be quite dangerous, but lacks the power to be consistently lethal. After another year or two of ceaselessly yammering about thirty-aught-sixes and twelve gauges, you receive what's expected to satisfy you...a four-ten. The downside is that a four-ten is the twenty-two of shot guns...deadly at point four yards. The upside is that you learn expert  stalking skills as you sneak into the middle of the flock of birds while your friends bumble around with their twelve gauges on the other side of the field.

At long last comes the day of your dreams...the day you buy your first hunting rifle. There's a problem though, now that you've bought your dream rifle - you have no time to hunt. Working from dawn to dark through all of hunting season was not calculated in...but there's next year...and the twelve gauge...and then year after that...and the glock...and year after that...and college...