SACRAFICES AND GIFTS

Over the course of my life, I have learned that giving gifts shouldn’t reflect your personal choices or wants, but more so of what the recipient would endear. And in this particular case, and for the first time, I left all my tangled feelings on the outside steps of a gun shop; because apparently, I liked that guy more than I wanted to believe.

If by chance you’re not aware, I’m not a gun enthusiast. Actually, I’m pretty much the opposite. Guns freak me out. I prefer hanging out on a beach, shoeless toes in the sand, and singing kumbaya songs around a campfire. Now I’m not one to judge if you enjoy rounds of ammunition and all sorts of guns lying around your home. I’m not judging you if you have an underground artillery. I honestly have a whatever kind of attitude toward this debate. But to literally walk into this type of establishment, well, that’s a whole new issue for me and one I won’t forget any time soon.

He received a vintage rifle inherited from his grandfather. Three years. For the past three years he’s taken this gun into the woods during hunting season and had never shot it. He told me the bullets were expensive. But I had a few other ideas of the reasoning. Of course, I could be far, far off. Regardless, for his birthday I decided to find these particular vintage bullets so the gun can do what it was designed for…shooting stuff.

The first step in the process of finding these particular rounds was research. Could I buy ammunition if I don’t own a gun license? Turns out, yes, yes I can. Okay. Next. I needed the specifics of the gun. Check. It was an 8mm Gewehr 98, which I had learned with the help of my neighbor that a [Ga-we’re]is a general term for rifle in German. Makes sense. Except there was a problem with simply buying bullets. The 98 was only manufactured until 1933. This rifle given to my friend came back from Germany during the second world war. Oops. Ten year difference. The specific bullets had a .01mm variance between those ten years. Does it matter? How the hell was I supposed to know? Do I look like a gun person?

I searched online for the nearest gun shop in my area so I could ask a lot of questions. Seems reasonable. Wrong. The advice given to me by family/friend gun people was simply, “Don’t be yourself,” which by definition means “Don’t talk too much and keep it to the point. No story telling.” Ahhh! I was really freaking out at this point, but I needed to move forward with my sacrificial gift-giving.

The nearest gun shop looked like the shop in Pulp Fiction. If you’ve seen this movie, you understand and are aware that my anxiety levels grew even higher than when I realized I was seriously going to a gun store. With guns. Everywhere. There had to be another place to shop in town, right? The next gun shop in the search engine was a little bit further away but seemed less scary in the images.

I took a few deep breaths in the parking lot, got out of my car, and recited the mantra, Don’t be me. Don’t be me. The first thing to greet me as I stepped into this new realm was dead things. Everywhere. Hanging from walls watching me. Judging me. I swear their big beautiful brown eyes followed me from the door to the counter. I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but there are guns everywhere in a gun shop. I felt my face flush. The blood rushed through my veins and all I could think was Don’t be me.

After a short exchange of learning they didn’t have these particular bullets, or rounds as I’m supposed to say, the man started talking a foreign language. Gun language. I’m pretty sure the only word I understood him say was “black eyed peas” but then again, that might not have been what he was saying at all. I left, thanking the nice gun people for their time and forced the vomit back into my gut when I safely made it to my car alive. Onto the Pulp Fiction place it is. Ugh. Would this day and experience ever end? He better love this gift.

The second shop was everything I thought it would be. Scarier than the first. Now, let me make sure for those of you still reading this ridiculous story, gun stuff is not my forte and all I want to do is play my guitar and partake in more exotic recreational fun. But instead, I had to Don’t be me.

I walked into the building with iron gates covering the windows and I told the owner that the other store sent me here. Once again, the man spoke that familiar sounding foreign language (gun language) and left. Yes, he just left me standing there with my hands in my pockets while gun barrels faced me from posters reading, “Prayer will get you to heaven. Trespassing will get you there faster.” Guns everywhere. It felt like an eternity. Was I supposed to follow him? Was I supposed to wait or leave? Buy a gun? I wasn’t sure…at all.

The owner finally came back with a small box of rounds, not bullets, and explained that that particular rifle, the 8mm Gewehr 98, were hard to come by. He found one manufacturer online, which wasn’t an option because his gun language told me something about needed to “void” or enter some number? Again, I didn’t pick up what he was laying down. However, he did offer me some rounds that a widow sold to him years ago. He explained in more gun language about the gun and the rounds and the year and the rifle and I understood none of it. I’m smart, but not that smart. It was beyond my comprehension.

To finish off, I bought that small, musky box of fifteen rounds and gave it as a birthday present. It might have been an elaborate research project, but more importantly, it was the look on his face that made me realize that I might not have gotten the correct bullets but I’m pretty sure he knew that my sacrifice of going beyond my comfort zone, made that gift even more special.

And with your birthday, buddy, another lesson learned. Thank you.