Today was my first day of the Project Appleseed Shoot. I showed up completely green, knowing essentially nothing about guns, and those awesome, patient men helped me to learn. I never dreamed there were so many details to remember – use the sling, make sure you find your Natural Point Of Aim (NPOA), pull up your “trigger leg” , keep the front sight on the target (while looking through the peep hole, lol), time the shot with your breathing, and as I thought I’d learned in martial arts, FOLLOW THROUGH. Sigh. I felt like I was trying to untangle Chinese noodles in my brain. Ah well, tomorrow is another day, I won’t be starting from zero, so maybe I will make more progress.

One of the challenges I had was that I was shooting right handed, but I tend to be left eye dominant (my right eye has weaker vision, so it makes sense). It really helped when one of the instructors suggested I put a small piece of tape on the left lens of my glasses. It was amazing. It didn’t seem to interfere with my vision, but it reminded my brain to sight with my right eye. Still, I think I may need new glasses, because it was really hard to see some of the targets, sometimes I felt like I was almost imagining the target – probably not the best way to go about it.

The instructors taught about the reasons behind the Revolutionary War and how rifleman skills made all the difference when fighting the regimented British Army. It had never occurred to me that those same American riflemen had fought alongside the British Army during the French and Indian War. They knew some of those men in their rifle sights. Wow. That’s tough guts. What a burning conviction of their rights and the injustices being imposed those men must have had to drive them to that point. Living in China made me appreciate my American rights, but thinking about the powerful conviction those men had and their sacrifice sears it in a level deeper. Now, having actually taken the opportunity and responsibility to learn this skill for myself, I can all the better appreciate what they could do and what they did.

Mr. Hot Stuff gets home tonight. It will be so nice to have him back and I wish I could be in two places at once tomorrow. One more day though, is a small price to pay for the experience and the chance to better understand what it means to have the right to keep and bear arms, and the responsibility that goes along with it.

winner-winner, chicken dinner 🙂