Redneck Golf

Most weekends my brother Chase and I would spend with my Grandmother, Mary Sue or as we all called her, Mazza. One probably should not compare other people to Jesus Christ but I’m going to anyway. In my eyes, she walked on water. I’ve never met a more loving, gentle, generous kind person in my life to date. She would do anything for anyone. She patiently looked after Bill, her schizophrenic neighbor for years without complaint, helped Mom take care of Chase and I and helped her sons whenever they got into trouble. I never herd her raise her voice in anger or say an unkind word about anyone ever. My Grandfather, Gilbert, was the same way according to Mom. He had passed away from cancer several years before I was born. Mazza was not rich but comfortable thanks to Gilbert who worked hard to support his family.

A typical weekend would go something like this. Mazza would pick Chase and I up from school and take us to her townhouse. Keep in mind this is the 70’s long before the internet, and only at the dawn of video games. We would play with toy soldiers, draw and watch TV. I still remember watching Walter Cronkite on the news, The Carol Burnett Show and of course Saturday morning cartoons. Later on we would watch the earliest episodes of Saturday Night Live. In the morning almost without fail she would make us pancakes topped with butter and karo syrup. That had to be the best breakfast in the world but perhaps not the most healthy. Often, we would see Bill.

Bill’s father lived in another state and would send money for him to live on. His father was a self-made millionaire who rose from floor sweeper to CEO of a corporation that’s a household name but will remain unnamed here. While Bill had serious mental health problems, he was absolutely harmless. When he was very young, he had been in a terrible fire that left his arms and neck severely scared. His torso may have been scared as well, but I never had an occasion to see. Bill was a lover of history, especially the Civil War. Many nights, he would take me on walks to the near-by convenience store, Parkway Curb Market or Duncan doughnuts a little further up the road. We had to cross at least four lanes of traffic or eight if we went to Duncan. Bill was very careful and we never even had a close call. He would buy me a soda or a doughnut and we would walk back all the while talking about The Civil War or guns. He was also an avid gun collector.

That’s right Bill collected guns, lots of guns. At one time he had over forty rifles, many of them very high powered.  Springfield .30-6, .220 Swift, Winchester 30-30 and a Colt AR-15 were some of the more notables in his collection. He may have been better armed than the Greensboro Police Department at the time. But all he ever shot was targets. There was a gun range out in the countryside that Uncle Frank would take us to, (except Mazza). He and Bill drilled into Chase and I how to safely handle guns. Handicapped or not, I learned how to shoot.

The gun range consisted of a large field with some old wooden tables at one end and a tall dirt bank at the other. At its longest point, the field was about one hundred yards. I started out with a little single shot .22 that I still have to this day. I’d lay my rifle on a rest on top of a pillow and bend down a little to see through the sites and pull the trigger. I mostly shot cans about twenty-five yards away. I could hit them pretty easily. It was more fun to aim for where the can came in contact with the ground. If I hit it just right, I could make the can jump. In time I started to shoot the bigger guns that Bill had blowing up gallon jugs of water and the occasional soft drink. These were more of a challenge. If I did not position the gun just right against my shoulder, the kick would hurt like hell. Imagine getting a punch directly onto your clavicle.  Even writing about it hurts. Shooting .22’s was easier and a whole lot cheaper so we would save the big guns until we were close to leaving. Shooting pistols was a different story.

I could not hold up a pistol and shoot it the same was as most other people could. I had to put on the table and use the rifle rest. You may be thinking this would not end well with most pistols and I think you would be right. But Old Uncle Frank made a work around. A .22 was fine and for anything larger, we used a heavy pistol and a light load combination. A .44 magnum loaded with a much lighter .44 special round for example. Not being really able to shoot and aim a pistol limited the fun so I mainly stuck to the .22 rifles. But I can say I shot a .22 a .357 and a .44 pistol. The watered down versions of the bigger guns was a real eye opening experience. You feel the power through your whole body. A .44 magnum can easily go through several walls in a house and still be lethal. Even as a little kid, I knew what this could do to someone on the receiving end and never ever played with a real gun as if it was a toy. Chase and I had toy guns for playing Civil War, cowboys and Indians or whatever else came to mind. Real guns were strictly for supervised trips to the gun range.           

We were very young, perhaps only seven or eight years old. It was great watching Bill shoot his monster rifles because he could get pretty creative sometimes. After all, he invented redneck golf. He would take a can of soda, shake it up walk down to the target area and place a golf ball on top. He’d then shoot it with nothing smaller than a .30-6. The can blew up sending the golf ball a hundred feet plus into the air sometimes never to be seen again.  We called it redneck golf.                  

             

Disclaimer : It was fun shooting and all but I'm not a gun nut. I no longer own guns.