Just Shoot

I went shooting recently. It was an empowering feeling to have that weapon cocked and loaded, waiting to be discharged, in my clumsy, shaking hands.
I was super nervous as the instructor assured me through my protective headphones that I was not going to hurt myself or others in the process, but I kept imagining someone running right in front of the targets at the last minute and freaking out. After I finally got a grip, both on the gun and on my hysterical imagination, I actually enjoyed the few rounds I managed to get in, especially since I hit the target smack in the torso and head area almost every single time. The instructor pretended to be impressed and told me that I was a natural, but I think that's part of the shooting gallery package, they have to butter you up into thinking you're Dirty Harry so you get into the experience some more. Knowing that did not prevent me from secretly agreeing with him, or from getting a massive ego boost ripping through that paper target. It's such a power trip to aim, fire off a bullet, and hit your mark right between the eyes. I can see why men love to kill things, besides being testosterone saturated eedjits. I've had a new found admiration for guns, and all things gun related since.

I have mixed emotions about crystal art. I get that the big names, Baccarat, Daum, and all the other important factories out there I'm too uncultured to bother remembering right now hired household names to do limited edition runs, or reinterpreted famous art pieces in glass, both beautiful and delicate, making it even more precious. A lot of it I could appreciate for it's practical value, pedestrian that I am, gorgeous chunky ashtrays, or jaw-dropping vintage chandeliers dripping colored crystals, mmmm, but the vases, the statues and lately the jewelery, its all a bit.. not for me. This gun however. This gun is a thing of such exquisite beauty. Its weighty without being heavy. Its comfortingly solid in the hand and yet, endlessly streamlined and easy on the eye. You give it mad respect for being such a statement of lethal power, but its only opaque glass, its so easy to chip, or break, or shatter, so deliciously fragile. This gun is an enigma you look forward to encountering instead of being annoyed by.


"Cat Among the Pigeons"