“You Must Have Been About Six”

            January 8, 2020. Our early morning hunt was not successful, we had no deer to pull out, skin and dress.  We were simply father and son, enjoying the mid-morning warmth and gazing over Mr. Shaw’s withered garden. 

            Daddy talked quietly as I eyed engraving on the  L. C. Smith double-barrel cradled in the crook of his arm.  Shifting the gun to his hands, he pointed the barrels toward the grey wooden panels of the garden fence—made from old orange crates, he said.   I asked about the panels, and daddy explained they were to keep rabbits from eating the vegetables—like Peter, I thought.  I stood, as attentive children stand, waiting for the grownup to make a move.  

            Suddenly, my father’s gun fired.  I was surprised, but not frightened.  I was used to hearing guns.  We stood for a moment in the dead silence that follows a gunshot. Then, daddy talked, while I carefully examined the hole in the fence panel.  It was neat and round, about the size of a quarter.   What really caught my eye was the contrast of the yellow splinters inside the panel with the weathered gray outside.  The wood, I learned, was two colors, one outside another inside.  As daddy continued talking, I peered through the hole at the sandy soil and dead garden debris.   

            More than thirty years later, I sat in my parent’s living room when the conversation turned to gun safety.  My father asked if I remembered his accidentally firing his gun at Shaw’s.  

            “No, when was that?” 

            “When we were looking over the garden one of your first deer hunts.  You must have been about six.” 

            My jaw dropped as my father said, “I staged that to let you know that even the most experienced of hunters could accidentally fire his gun.” 

            I began laughing.  My father looked puzzled.  Mother asked, “What’s funny?”

            “You thought, I thought that was an accident?” 

            “Yes,” my father even more puzzled, “what did you think?” 

            “ I thought you wanted to show me what a neat hole your shotgun could blow through the fence panel.”