All I can do is write about it...

I don't know if that song really fits with this post, but the song title seemed to. And if you don't know what song that is, you really need to brush up on your Lynyrd Skynyrd. Here's a little excerpt for you non-civilized folks:

 

"And Lord I can't make any changes
All I can do is write 'em in a song(or blog)
I can see the concrete slowly creepin'
Lord take me and mine before that comes "

I’m not real sure what I can say about all of this gun-control garbage floating around the internet that hasn’t already been said in some form or fashion. Yes, I despise the notion of any slimy politician and shitty government trying to take away the rights granted to me by the Founding Fathers, but instead of doing the same old song and dance, I’ll try to put a little different spin on the subject and take it down a different path. Away from the pot-hole ridden Chicago streets of magazine restrictions and assault weapon bans and towards the prettier Charleston-esque cobblestone avenue(which lasts for generations) that leads to the core of how people behave. Parenting. No, I’m not a parent myself, but I was raised by some salt-of-the-earth people, so I know a thing or two about how kids should act.

I grew up in a little town. I think we had somewhere around the neighborhood of 3,500 people that lived in town and 36,000ish people in a county that is larger than Dallas County. We were rural. We hunted. Guns were basically thought of as an extra appendage. I was armed with an awfully dangerous Red Ryder before I was 5 and my management of the local bird and squirrel population began soon thereafter. There has been a loaded gun in my house for as long as I can remember(and it wasn’t in a safe with a trigger lock on it).  I could walk into any of my friend’s house and find at least one loaded shotgun propped up behind a door. We weren’t taught that they were scary objects that were just made for killing. We weren’t led to believe that guns are made to assault people with. Our parents didn’t freak out at the sight of us holding a gun that was probably as tall as we were at the age of 7. We were taught to respect guns. We were taught that once you pull the trigger on a gun, you can’t un-pull it and the bullet can’t be brought back. We were taught that every gun is loaded at all times, until you open the chamber and see for yourself that it’s not. We were taught that they were to be used for sport, grocery shopping, and protecting your house and your family. And when we slipped up and forgot something that we were taught, we were reminded with a swift belt to the ass. Guns safety was serious, but guns themselves were a common, everyday type of tool.

 Our parents did something different than many parents seem to do today…they parented. We were all given responsibilities and jobs to do as a child, and we were expected to do them. We were taught to respect people. Old people, young people, black people, white people. Even those jacklegs that went to the school in the next town over. We might not have liked everyone, but we damn sure respected them. We picked on each other like there was no tomorrow, but if any of us needed a shirt, there would have been 15 bare-chested kids in the blink of an eye with their shirts in outstretched hand. We were raised to be respectable young men and women who knew right from wrong(even though we didn’t always pay that any attention) and didn’t talk back to anyone older than us. We were taught to not expect any handouts and that we are supposed to take care of ourselves; that we aren’t anyone else’s responsibility(especially the governments, but that’s a rant for a different time). Funny how a parent, of all people, can teach that. We didn’t cuss our teachers or coaches, and shooting up a school because we got picked on sure as hell never crossed our minds, because we lived in the real world, thanks to our parents. Did I mention there were at least 15-20 shotguns or rifles in the school parking lot during any particular hunting season, and a hundred pocket knives floating around the hallways every day? Our parents made sure that we could function in a society made up of all kinds of people; from good to bad, mean to nice, and everything in between. We were mostly expected to have hobbies that included real human beings and not just some computer animated graphic. Sure, some of us played video games. Yes, we watched TV. And of course we got angry at our parents for doing their jobs and thought that they didn’t know their ass from a hole in the ground every now and then. But our parents made sure that we lived on planet earth, feared our God, and taught us how to make it through life’s struggles(albeit in a weird way at times) without going on a killing spree.

Now I’m not trying to say that we were perfect little kids that never got into trouble. In fact, that’s about as big of a lie as I could tell. We got into all kinds of trouble. Tearing up a field in our trucks. Tearing up our trucks in a field. Sneaking beer. Staying out too late. I could keep going, but that’s not the point of this rant. The point of this rant(as convoluted as it may be) is a lot of all of this horrible crime that has been happening lately, in my eyes at least, has to do with parents not being parents. “But these aren’t highschool kids doing the shooting” you say. Well if you feel that way, then I guess you think it’s always the guns fault too, don’t you? Respect for people, common decency, a fear of God(whether it be my God or yours doesn’t really matter) , and how to cope with the real world are all things that children begin learning at a very young age(and continue learning until their last breath) when a parent is doing their job. I’m not trying to say that disasters like Columbine or Sandy Hook will cease to exist if all parents did their jobs, because that’s just not true. Evil has been around as long as man-kind and unfortunately, it’s not going anywhere. I know not everyone is going to be raised in a rural, small town, firearm-friendly setting and that’s not the point I’m trying to make either, but if that’s what you took away from this, either your reading comprehension level is down around the level of a whale crap, or I’m a terrible writer and I’m ok with either situation. Regardless, what I am trying to say, is if more children were raised the way we were, by real parents(and grandparents and friend’s parents) rather than letting them live in some fantasy world, more people would be able to deal with reality when it gives them a 5-finger slap across the face and less people would be taking out their anger and frustration with the world on innocent lives.

So if you’ve got parents who raised you right, give them a call and tell them thanks for turning you into a decent person. Maybe you thought they were crazy back then, but I’m sure you see things a little differently these days.