I became a grandfather on a Sunday and spent the day repairing bullet holes in the roof. Long story, and not enough space to explain here.
Ian came late in my life, and he lives on the other side of the country, so I question how much of an influence I will have on his life. I have already bought him a rifle and a fishing rod of course, which is a start. If I am not able to teach him how to use these, his mom and dad will.
He comes from tough stock; both of his parents have carried a gun while serving their country. I like to think he will grow up knowing the gun culture.
The future is never certain and is always fluid. Social change is never stagnant and we can’t be sure what is to happen. Still, the gun world has been very good to me, both as a career and a passion. My hope is that I will be able to show him a little bit about what makes it so special. My further hope is that he always lives in a country that allows those options.
When each of my own children were born, I wrote and published an editorial about what I hoped for them in life. In reading them now, decades later, I can see that while I got a few predictions wrong, far more of them were right. Some of what was right was covered by me teaching them both about guns, shooting, handloading, hunting and competition. Thankfully it stuck, and they both remain a part of the gun world today.
I also taught them about life—primarily by example—and I hope I got most of it right. I think I did, and I am proud of them and the adults they have become. The biggest wish anyone can have is that the people they influence in life grow into good, well-directed and happy adults. In my world it includes shooting, as it can bring joy as well as morality.
In writing about my grandson, I wish all that for him as well, of course. Not so much that he goes to war like his dad, but that he lives in a world where that’s not needed. Guns may become dominant in his life as they have been in mine, or maybe he will take a different road (one that pays better if he inherited any brains from Grandma). Still, I hope he becomes a shooter, embraces the gun world and that I live long enough to teach him about the subtleties of the lifestyle. He may not travel that path, however the most important thing is he is free to choose and that he is instilled with the wisdom to make those decisions.
I hope to teach him about honesty, courage, morality and to do what is right, even when that is the tougher choice. I hope that he may find happiness in this screwy world, and in doing so, his moral compass is always pointed north. I firmly believe that the two are connected. The only truly happy people I have ever known are clear headed about right and wrong, justice and morality. These things are black and white with happy folks and fade to shades of gray with the discontented.
My grandson has entered a world that is a mess right now, and will grow up in a location that might well be the epicenter of that chaos. It’s not going to be easy, but then anything worth doing never is, because easy rarely contains value.
The harsh truth, though, is unless something changes, I am going to be a distant part of his life, and all these hopes for our personal interactions are probably moot. With thousands of miles separating us, I will, at best, see him a few times a year. That pains me greatly, but it goes to what I am talking about in terms of the world. I am old and quite deeply entrenched in a dark-blue state. This place was much different when I came into the world but, like the frog in the cooking pot, it slowly morphed far to the other side while life kept me too occupied to make the changes I should have. Now, it’s probably too late. I have few regrets in life, but staying here is one of them.
With fools running this place, opportunities for anyone starting out have dwindled. That is why both of my kids and now my grandchild live so far away. My kids moved to find opportunity and it was the right thing to do. I stayed, and will now feel the pain of that choice in knowing my grandson will grow up mostly without knowing me.
Still, those things I want to teach him, he will learn by proxy. I taught them to my daughter, and she proved a good student. I expect her to be a good teacher as well and bring my hopes to life.
I suppose that legacy is the best any of us can hope for.
