My brother and I knew exactly where the BB gun was kept. Out in the detached garage away from my grandparents house tucked away in the garage. After begging for permission, we would sprint out the back screened door, run along the winding brick path to the door of that garage and seek out the rifle.
The BB gun was fun. Fun in a way that only little boys crave. The smell of the oil, the rattle of the BB's in the muzzle clip and the feel of the hardwood that felt so stiff against a young boy's frame. It was a beautiful bronze with the name DAISY imprinted just above the trigger pull. The single action, one-cock was firm but easily negotiated by a determined boy. Especially when two determined boys were working on it.
Several years before my grandpa had purchased the air rifle to pick off the unsuspecting vermin who inhabited the woods across the alley and behind their house. For the occasional squirrel who either didn't get the head's up from his fellow rodents or just plain temped fate, my grandpa would pump the single action Daisy once and the epitaph would be said.
As my grandpa got older, his lame arm and health made it difficult to try to hold the rifle in the proper position, so with the help of my grandma, they would sit on their covered swing, in their tranquil back yard that overlooked their flowers and bird bath and look towards the woods for targets. With my grandfather's excellent eyesight scanning for prey and my grandmother's somewhat steadier hands holding the rifle. Most of these attempted team efforts typically ended up in both of them laughing so hard that nothing would be accomplished - much to the pleasure of the onlooking woodland creatures.
The woods across the alley were both fascinating and terrifying at the same time to a young boy and I would spend tremendous amounts of time playing in the back yard of my grandparent's little yellow house in the shadow of the woods. They were dark and dense - typical of upper Midwestern natural forests, but this one was in the middle of town. Wholly undeveloped land that had survived the woodsman's axe and the bulldozers of progress.
This was probably very fitting for the house my grandparents lived in. Very small - maybe 800 SF with a small kitchen and bathroom at the rear and a living space and the "master" bedroom on the main floor. You had to walk through my grandparents room to get to the steep staircase that led to the second floor that was only large enough to be carved out of the rafters and hold two small beds and a couple of dressers.
My father grew up here with his five older and one younger sister. The eldest three were on their way out of the house to be married young that was typical of the day and my dad's middle sister who was entering junior high school by the time that he was born. For a time, four children lived in that little upstairs.
My father left Minnesota after a couple of years in junior college to attend a private school out west where he met my mother and then settled. Annually we would load up as a family and dive the 1,500 miles to spend a month with my grandparents and my aunts, uncles and cousins that still lived in the area. Two-and-a-half days in a fully packed full-sized station wagon that I can only imagine now what craziness it took for my parents to lug my brother, sister and I on that cross-country journey only to repeat it to come home a few weeks later.
My brother and I would start to salivate at the sweet reunion of our little monkey hands and that air rifle and we would start to daydream about what big game we would stalk in the big, dark woods across the alley and who would get to go first to test their marksmanship skills. Our eyes would start to glisten as we crossed the Minnesota state line and as we finally pulled into the alley to park the car upon our arrival, we could barely contain ourselves.
On one particular visit we had received the go ahead from my grandpa and my dad to set up a paper plate target across the alley and for my brother and I to take turns peppering the cellulose disk with the little brass BB's until dinner time. My brother, who is two years younger was six at the time and he had drawn the first straw at target practice.
My grandparents house was close to the corner, but not on it and to the north side of their home was an empty lot that had been cleared some time in its past that was now the habitat of wild grasses that were nearly as tall as we were. The alley was the divider between the dark woods to the east and the vacant lot to the west. A service street was on the north side of the block and across from it was one of the 10,000 lakes that Minnesota was famous for.
My brother had already popped off several direct hits and a few misses at the helpless paper target. I had walked across the alley to look at his progress when out of the corner of my eye I spied a figure out moving on the service street, their shape partially obscured by the forest was now in plain sight at the end of the alley and then quickly moving into the area north of the grassy lot.
It was a woman jogging on the street.
I casually dared my brother to shoot her. Not really thinking at all of any consequences of if he actually hit her. I honestly didn't think he would and she would just keep on going. But the events were unfolding quickly and I didn't spend much time pondering any possible outcomes with any associated consequences.
The BB gun was fun. Fun in a way that only little boys crave. The smell of the oil, the rattle of the BB's in the muzzle clip and the feel of the hardwood that felt so stiff against a young boy's frame. It was a beautiful bronze with the name DAISY imprinted just above the trigger pull. The single action, one-cock was firm but easily negotiated by a determined boy. Especially when two determined boys were working on it.
Several years before my grandpa had purchased the air rifle to pick off the unsuspecting vermin who inhabited the woods across the alley and behind their house. For the occasional squirrel who either didn't get the head's up from his fellow rodents or just plain temped fate, my grandpa would pump the single action Daisy once and the epitaph would be said.
As my grandpa got older, his lame arm and health made it difficult to try to hold the rifle in the proper position, so with the help of my grandma, they would sit on their covered swing, in their tranquil back yard that overlooked their flowers and bird bath and look towards the woods for targets. With my grandfather's excellent eyesight scanning for prey and my grandmother's somewhat steadier hands holding the rifle. Most of these attempted team efforts typically ended up in both of them laughing so hard that nothing would be accomplished - much to the pleasure of the onlooking woodland creatures.
The woods across the alley were both fascinating and terrifying at the same time to a young boy and I would spend tremendous amounts of time playing in the back yard of my grandparent's little yellow house in the shadow of the woods. They were dark and dense - typical of upper Midwestern natural forests, but this one was in the middle of town. Wholly undeveloped land that had survived the woodsman's axe and the bulldozers of progress.
This was probably very fitting for the house my grandparents lived in. Very small - maybe 800 SF with a small kitchen and bathroom at the rear and a living space and the "master" bedroom on the main floor. You had to walk through my grandparents room to get to the steep staircase that led to the second floor that was only large enough to be carved out of the rafters and hold two small beds and a couple of dressers.
My father grew up here with his five older and one younger sister. The eldest three were on their way out of the house to be married young that was typical of the day and my dad's middle sister who was entering junior high school by the time that he was born. For a time, four children lived in that little upstairs.
My father left Minnesota after a couple of years in junior college to attend a private school out west where he met my mother and then settled. Annually we would load up as a family and dive the 1,500 miles to spend a month with my grandparents and my aunts, uncles and cousins that still lived in the area. Two-and-a-half days in a fully packed full-sized station wagon that I can only imagine now what craziness it took for my parents to lug my brother, sister and I on that cross-country journey only to repeat it to come home a few weeks later.
My brother and I would start to salivate at the sweet reunion of our little monkey hands and that air rifle and we would start to daydream about what big game we would stalk in the big, dark woods across the alley and who would get to go first to test their marksmanship skills. Our eyes would start to glisten as we crossed the Minnesota state line and as we finally pulled into the alley to park the car upon our arrival, we could barely contain ourselves.
On one particular visit we had received the go ahead from my grandpa and my dad to set up a paper plate target across the alley and for my brother and I to take turns peppering the cellulose disk with the little brass BB's until dinner time. My brother, who is two years younger was six at the time and he had drawn the first straw at target practice.
My grandparents house was close to the corner, but not on it and to the north side of their home was an empty lot that had been cleared some time in its past that was now the habitat of wild grasses that were nearly as tall as we were. The alley was the divider between the dark woods to the east and the vacant lot to the west. A service street was on the north side of the block and across from it was one of the 10,000 lakes that Minnesota was famous for.
My brother had already popped off several direct hits and a few misses at the helpless paper target. I had walked across the alley to look at his progress when out of the corner of my eye I spied a figure out moving on the service street, their shape partially obscured by the forest was now in plain sight at the end of the alley and then quickly moving into the area north of the grassy lot.
It was a woman jogging on the street.
I casually dared my brother to shoot her. Not really thinking at all of any consequences of if he actually hit her. I honestly didn't think he would and she would just keep on going. But the events were unfolding quickly and I didn't spend much time pondering any possible outcomes with any associated consequences.
Without blinking he turned to her, drew a bead on the long barrel of the airgun and fired.
The BB zipped through the air with that familiar hiss, skimming across the top of the tall grass in the vacant lot to accurately smack the unsuspecting jogger in her upper left shoulder. She let out a loud yelp and immediately stopped.
We froze. Time and space ground to a standstill as we slowly grasped the realization of the amazing shot. My six-year-old brother had just nailed a moving target over tall grass. It was truly remarkable and incredible. We stood motionless in the hallows of the alley, across from the drive to the garage and the shadow of the forest beyond.
The jogger looked back our way searching for the violator who had stung her. She must have realized that it wasn't a bug that bit her or any other than someone who had deliberately tried to hurt her. Our eyes met and she yelled at us and started to move our way.
For a brief second we stood in our motionless stance then the reality (and the gravity) of what we had just done flooded our conscienceness and we both fled. As all little boys do, it's at least worth a shot a fleeing than it is to take whatever wrath that was broiling our way.
Now an experienced perpetrator would have run away from any "home base" as to not alert the "authorities" to any possible wrong doing. In retrospect, we had a dense forest we could have ducted into or ran up the alley and across the train tracks. But our youth and strong desire to run to something familiar directed us both to my grandparents property with my brother trucking inside and me, being slightly more aware of avoiding my parents running to the front yard.
The woman followed, pounded on the door and confronted my dad with the awful truth of our deed.
Now, I wasn't there to know what actually transpired, and maybe the human instinct for self preservation has blocked out the series of events that occurred and maybe it's best that it stays that way. In any case, after the woman had left and my father's temper had been properly elevated, my brother took the brunt of the punishment since he was the trigger man. I, of course, was the older responsible brother who should have known better took a slightly less severe, although still memorable quality time with my father's belt.
The BB gun was moved into protective custody and my brother and I were banned from any future contact for an indefinite period of time. We were fortunate that the woman didn't press any charges and that my dad didn't actually impose the death penalty for such a ridiculous absence of judgement by his two sons. The remainder of the vacation was tense and crowded since we weren't allowed to spend much time out doors without supervision.
Many years have passed since the Great Shot so skillfully executed by my little brother. And there isn't a time when I hold a BB gun that I don't think of that episode. How the innocence of thought can lead young boys to do such awful things and that remorse for such actions can only come to a boy after the transgression has been documented and the penalties assessed. For it is then that the connection is made between action and consequences for that action.
But that with learning comes experience and that sometimes that experience isn't positive. All of which is woven into the tapestry of youth and finds it's home in the foundations of a man.
But even to this day it doesn't stop me from quietly thinking: that was an DAMN AWESOME shot!
The BB zipped through the air with that familiar hiss, skimming across the top of the tall grass in the vacant lot to accurately smack the unsuspecting jogger in her upper left shoulder. She let out a loud yelp and immediately stopped.
We froze. Time and space ground to a standstill as we slowly grasped the realization of the amazing shot. My six-year-old brother had just nailed a moving target over tall grass. It was truly remarkable and incredible. We stood motionless in the hallows of the alley, across from the drive to the garage and the shadow of the forest beyond.
The jogger looked back our way searching for the violator who had stung her. She must have realized that it wasn't a bug that bit her or any other than someone who had deliberately tried to hurt her. Our eyes met and she yelled at us and started to move our way.
For a brief second we stood in our motionless stance then the reality (and the gravity) of what we had just done flooded our conscienceness and we both fled. As all little boys do, it's at least worth a shot a fleeing than it is to take whatever wrath that was broiling our way.
Now an experienced perpetrator would have run away from any "home base" as to not alert the "authorities" to any possible wrong doing. In retrospect, we had a dense forest we could have ducted into or ran up the alley and across the train tracks. But our youth and strong desire to run to something familiar directed us both to my grandparents property with my brother trucking inside and me, being slightly more aware of avoiding my parents running to the front yard.
The woman followed, pounded on the door and confronted my dad with the awful truth of our deed.
Now, I wasn't there to know what actually transpired, and maybe the human instinct for self preservation has blocked out the series of events that occurred and maybe it's best that it stays that way. In any case, after the woman had left and my father's temper had been properly elevated, my brother took the brunt of the punishment since he was the trigger man. I, of course, was the older responsible brother who should have known better took a slightly less severe, although still memorable quality time with my father's belt.
The BB gun was moved into protective custody and my brother and I were banned from any future contact for an indefinite period of time. We were fortunate that the woman didn't press any charges and that my dad didn't actually impose the death penalty for such a ridiculous absence of judgement by his two sons. The remainder of the vacation was tense and crowded since we weren't allowed to spend much time out doors without supervision.
Many years have passed since the Great Shot so skillfully executed by my little brother. And there isn't a time when I hold a BB gun that I don't think of that episode. How the innocence of thought can lead young boys to do such awful things and that remorse for such actions can only come to a boy after the transgression has been documented and the penalties assessed. For it is then that the connection is made between action and consequences for that action.
But that with learning comes experience and that sometimes that experience isn't positive. All of which is woven into the tapestry of youth and finds it's home in the foundations of a man.
But even to this day it doesn't stop me from quietly thinking: that was an DAMN AWESOME shot!
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