calibration

With time, misfortune can become comedy. You've probably heard someone say (or maybe said it yourself), "someday we'll look back on this and laugh". Usually it's said in the midst of an unfortunate or difficult situation. A few years ago I had that thought, as I stood in an open dirt lot, hands raised in the air as several policemen pointed their guns at me. Well actually, the thought was more like, "if I live to look back on this, someday I'll look back on this and laugh."

I suppose some background is in order. Somewhere back about 15 years ago or so, a friend and I decided it would be awesome to take up target shooting. Neither of us had any real firearms experience, so we decided to start our sharpshooting adventures with CO2-powered pellet guns. For some reason I think we were spending a lot of time hanging out at K-Mart and they had a selection of pistols to choose from, modeled after real guns. My buddy chose a Dirty Harry-style .44 Magnum revolver replica with the long barrel and 6 shots. My weapon of choice ended up being the Colt .45 semiautomatic replica. They were both made of black plastic, but from a distance they certainly looked like the real thing. Both guns fired .177 caliber pellets and used CO2 gas cartridges to propel the ammo with satisfying velocity, enough to let us blast small holes in soda cans and whatever else we happened to have around as a target.

After a ricochet from a more solid food can zinged right back past my head I figured that we should stick to thinner and softer targets. And maybe shoot from a farther distance than our backyards might allow. We were young(er) and (more) foolish, and one weekend it occurred to us that we should go find an open area to do our plinking in. I knew of some new housing developments nearby where the homes hadn't been built yet and there was plenty of space, so my friend, my brother and I hopped in the car and headed out there with our pistols and some cans for targets.

So we found an empty lot where we set up and started shooting. At one point I saw a pickup truck driving along through the development heading our way. Whoever it was spotted us and almost violently came to a stop. As I watched, it quickly backed up and sped away. I should have known right then and there that it was time to split. Instead we shrugged and kept firing away.

Maybe ten minutes later, the other shoe dropped. A black-and-white police car came along but stopped well short of where we were. Uh-oh. I motioned to my friend to cease fire and started to unload my pistol, tossing it to the dirt. Maybe a minute or so later, about two or three more police cars arrived. Backup now on the scene, the po-po charged up to where we were, lights flashing and all. One of them was a K-9 unit with a police dog in the back. Almost immediately the cops were out of the cars, guns drawn and pointing right at us. "Hands in the air!" one of them gruffly shouted. I'm pretty sure I put mine up immediately. Apparently either my brother or my friend wasn't quick enough, because the next command was "Hands out of your pocket, right now!"

Wind blowing in my face as I faced the five-oh, in my mind I was already expecting to see the flashing muzzles as they took us down. Maybe I had seen too many bad-cop movies but I totally saw the scene going down like this: One of the cops sees something they don't like and puts one of us down. The others open up on the rest of us either out of panic, or to cover their tracks and write up whatever story they want. Dead men tell no tales. "Yeah, the perps saw us come up and didn't cooperate, one of them drew for a weapon and we had to rock 'n roll on they ass!" We'd be face down in the dirt and they could drop a few planted weapons on us to justify the takedown. One of them came towards me and told me to turn around, away from him. Oh, shit.

But the shots didn't come. Instead I felt a hand patting me down, feeling what I had in my pockets. OK, maybe I'll survive this encounter after all. They had us standing there at gunpoint for several minutes, reaching for the sky while one of them checked out what we had dropped to the ground. It didn’t take long for them to figure out what we were up to, and that we weren’t hardened criminals in the middle of some high-stakes drug or arms deal. Just a couple of kids with pellet guns plinking around. Then they rounded us up and led us back to our car. They were surprisingly cool about the whole thing. Perhaps just relieved that it hadn’t turned into a shootout at the OK Corral. They returned our pistols and basically told us to get lost. Subdued and feeling lucky we had gotten off so easy, we got back in our car and got out of Dodge as quick as we could. Our interest in target-shooting diminished pretty rapidly after that. I think we took up bowling for a while instead. Nobody gets shot while bowling.

Years later, yeah I think I can look back on that incident and laugh a little. We were dumb kids but we managed to avoid Darwinian selection. And you know what, I still enjoy trying to hit a bulls-eye with a well-placed shot. A few months ago some coworkers and I got together, and some of them had rifles and pistols so we went down to the gun range and spent an enjoyable morning blasting targets. One of them had a powerful scoped AR-15 rifle that could nail a bulls-eye at 100 yards with ease. But when the time came to switch to pistols and do some closer-range targets, that was when the spark lit up inside me again. Like driving fast on a twisty road or at a race track, I really enjoy the focus and precision involved in target shooting. For that fleeting moment in time, you clear your head of all other distractions, and for me, the singular purity of purpose is where I can find inner peace. Am I a pro race driver or an expert marksman? Not at all, but as they say, life is about the journey not the destination. As long as you have fun, who cares if you don’t win the race or shoot a perfect target every time?

I hate to say it but in this crazy world sometimes you also need to be ready to protect yourself and those you care about, not just rely on the protection of others. So my pursuit of skill and precision has a practical aspect as well. After a lot of deliberation and consulting with some knowledgeable friends, I decided to purchase my own semiautomatic pistol. I went to the range a few more times, to test out some of the pistols I was considering. Ultimately I decided on the Sig-Sauer P226 .40SW, which is weapon of choice for many elite military and law enforcement units around the world, including the US Navy Seals, British SAS, and the NYPD. If it’s rugged, reliable, and accurate enough for these guys, surely it’s good enough for me. The .40 caliber round is also ideal for a home defense weapon due to its stopping power and accuracy. The Sig is a popular and sometimes hard to get pistol, so I put in an order at the local shop for one and can’t wait until it comes in!