How Does that Happen?

One of the suggested posts in my post request bleg (Zercool's question of "Or how about how you ended up being a Mass gun nut...") was an explanation of how I became a gun nut living in the People’s Republic of Massachusetts. It’s an interesting question, as MA’s reputation as an anti-gun state is well-known and very deserved - we truly do have some of the most onerous gun laws in the nation. It’s surprising that anyone would ever become a gun nut living in MA, as the public perception doesn’t exactly foster an attitude of tolerance for those of us who support the second amendment.

Some of it comes from my environment - Dad was a MA state cop when I was a child, and there were obviously guns in the house. From a very early age I was taught how to properly handle firearms, that they were not toys but dangerous tools that demanded respect. I was shown how to load and unload Dad’s service revolver (yes, this was back in the days when cops were still issued six-shooters…); I was taught very young that Daddy’s gun was not something to be feared, but that care needed to be taken whenever I was around a gun.

I don’t know for certain that they knew that I’d show my father’s gun to my friends; I suspect that, since my grandfather was a town cop and also had guns in the house that my dad himself might have shown off *his* father’s revolver. It’s a natural progression - your son brings a friend over; the friend knows that a family member is in law enforcement; they want to see the gun. Little boys (and some little girls) are fascinated by things that go bang, be it guns, fireworks, or internal combustion engines. I won’t ‘fess up, except to note that *if* I had shown Dad’s gun, it was *ALWAYS* under circumstances that paid homage to the four rules of gun safety and that all safety precautions were followed. And if I had let a friend handle the gun, and he were to handle it unsafely, I would have taken it away immediately…

My grandfather was a collector by circumstance; he owned a diner in the aftermath of the Great Depression and quite often took someone’s old rusted break-top Iver Johnson as payment of a month’s worth of breakfasts. He had a dizzying assortment of pump-action shotguns and side-by-sides; his trusty lever action Marlin (his “deer gun” as it were) and his “Italian Battle Rifle: Only dropped once” (that was his favorite gun-related joke). He had these firearms stored in two massive wooden gun cabinets - one he made himself - that I have in my attic awaiting my transplantation to America…

And part of it is just a lifelong fascination with history and engineering. Firearms, when properly made and cared for, can and will last for decades or longer - the Colt Official Police my grandfather carried as a town police officer in the 1950s is still shooting bullseyes in the 21^st century. And G-d willing, it’ll go to TheBoy or his son, a tangible link to the past and the man who gave us all our names. Where else but a gun cabinet can you pick up a machine built in the latter part of the 19^th century and use it exactly like your great grandfather might have used it?

And that’s one of the many reasons I am proud to call myself a gun nut, even in the Volksrepublik of Massachusetts…

That is all.