In third or fourth grade, probably fourth grade, my brother shot me with the BB gun Santa left for me in the living room under the tree just a couple hours earlier. My brother didn’t say he was sorry, well, probably because a few minutes before, l had shot him. Mom didn’t even bother hollering at us.

It stung for a minute and left a red mark. I loved that BB gun. Right now, the same gun is in my basement gathering dust. Back in the day it was used to shoot at targets, some squirrels, birds and trees. Doubt I ever hit a bird or a squirrel and I probably missed most targets. Haven’t shot it in several decades. Don’t know if it still works.

The reason I wanted, actually desperately needed, that BB gun was to protect me and the family from bad guys. Fortunately, that BB gun was never placed into service repelling an attack by a gang of notorious criminals. However, my trusty BB gun remains at the ready should the bad guys ever show up.

Back in the day, distinguishing between the good and the bad guys seemed pretty straight forward. Everyone I liked was a good guy. Bad guys included jerks like Mike B, whose dad ended up grounding him for tying me to a tree in the woods.

Mike was older than I was. As an adult, he is a nice guy. A couple years after being tied to a tree, he gave me my first ride on a motorcycle. As I aged, I came to know the line between good and bad is often blurred. Nobody is perfect, mostly nobody is all bad either.

My BB gun looked to an eight year old me, just like the Winchester rifles used by all the famous TV Cowboys in the western TV shows: Bonanza, The Lone Ranger, Maverick, Roy Rogers and the list goes on.

Wish I hadn’t but I just went down to the basement to look at my trusty BB gun. In my mind, it was full sized and looked close to being a real Winchester rifle from the late 1800’s.

Sadly, my BB gun is actually about half the size of a real Winchester rifle, not really that good of a Winchester imitation and maybe worst of all, my trusty rifle is not in very good condition. The pump action jammed and the trim is falling off. We are all showing our age, I guess.

My BB gun was the perfect weapon to deter bad guys from even thinking about attacking our home. They’d never know what hit them. The local authorities would have been so appreciative that I, a nine or tenyear old kid, captured the thugs which were terrorizing so many. My plan was to go upstairs and shoot down at them from the windows.

I was in my forties when my mom moved into an apartment from the house I grew up in. She gave me my dad’s two old guns. A 12 gage shotgun and a rifle that I have no recollection of what kind it was. Not being a hunter or a gun person, I sold them to a gun shop. The point being, I can’t actually say I never owned a real gun, but as a practical matter, the only gun I’ve ever really “owned”, was my trusty BB gun.

So far, in seventy years, fortunately, nobody has ever broken into my house or held me at gunpoint. No situations have come up where me having a gun would have been beneficial. No drug addicts or prison escapees have ever come to our door demanding our valuables or taken us hostage so we can be exchanged for ransom.

We have had some Mormons, people who want me to sign a petition to save the planet and political candidates but they were all very polite and left when I politely asked them to leave.

About fifteen years ago there were several break-ins around our neighborhood over a couple month period. To my knowledge nobody was ever home when the robbers came in. However, our house was not one that was broken into.

We do hear about a catalytic converter being stolen here or there. Periodically there are some porch pirates who steal packages or someone reports a garage being broken into. I can’t recall any instances in our area where someone forced their way into a house while someone was home.

To date my personal interaction with criminals has been pretty much limited to phone calls trying to talk me into sending them money for one reason or another. BB guns, or any other gun, doesn’t work against phone call scams. I have known people who have fallen for them but I have not.

Some people own guns for hunting and handguns for protection. They bought their guns legally and have taken safety classes. Some of them enjoy going to firing ranges to practice shooting. Some people I know enjoy hunting and have guns for that purpose. One of my friends used to be on a skeet shooting team. He loved that sport until medical issues caused him to quit.

Except for those I know who used guns as part of their job, law enforcement or military, I don’t remember knowing anyone personally who has fired their guns at another human. I have known of people who have shot themselves. Although right now, I don’t remember who, so maybe I just think I knew people who used a gun to take their own life.

My trusty BB gun, back in the day, would leave a red mark and sting for a bit. Maybe it could shoot an eye out but in my case, it didn’t.

The closer you look the more you see.