Growing up in rural Montana – about 10 miles north of Helena, the capital city, neighbors had horses, dirt road, cactus in the back yard – we were introduced to guns fairly early in life. I think I skipped the “you’ll shoot your eye out!” bb-gun that many friends were getting and moved on to a pump-action single shot pellet-gun around the age of 8.
After losing interest in killing things for a while, I decided at about 16 that I should take up hunting. I killed a deer. I gave up hunting.
Then I got into trap shooting, joined the ATA (Amateur Trapshooting Association, a kinder, gentler version of the NRA), and toured the state with my dad winning little 1oz silver coins (now worth about $36 each, yay) and other oddities. And then college hit and it’s been about 10 years since I’ve really shot much. But now, back in Montana visiting family, I’ve picked it up again. Family.
File under “ya never know.”
I had a gun when I lived in North Dakota, but I never shot anything with it. We'd go out and shoot pop cans and the like.
Dude, we should totally go shooting sometime. I have a small arsenal that you might enojoy!
Yea, in NoDak, like Montana, it's pretty normal I think to have some sort of gun; especially growing up on the poorer end of the socio-economic spectrum, where a bullet or two could mean good food for several months or more.Kyle, I'd love to. I'd just have to get myself back to the DC area (I think I just vomited in my mouth). Speaking of which, I did just come across a fellowship that I might apply for next year that would have me working at the good ol' DoS
http://www.acls.org/programs/publicfellows/
Awesome! We could go for long drives around the beltway during rush hour for the fun of it!
I have a feeling that would end up looking something like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5f_gbzo4Q0
I own a shotgun that has never been fired. My grandparents entered my name in a gun raffle when I was maybe 16. I won a very nice 12 gauge. I assembled it, then took it apart and packed it up again. It lives in my parents' attic somewhere.
The sooner guns and Buddhism are OK together, the sooner the Dharma will influence America deeply!:-)Lot of Buddhists love guns (though they may be in the closet)!Great picture !Fun smiles!
Perhaps we can create NRAB, "National Rifle Association of Buddhists"? Or, better, NRAP, "National Rifle Association for Pacifists"? With slogans like "Guns for Peace" – "kill cans/clays, not kids" (that's a bit much maybe) or "My Gun is in the Attic, where it BELONGS"…
In the last days of April, 2011, the Chinese government abducted hundreds of Tibetan boys and girls, all of them students from Ngaba, after confiscating and burning all their books of study. The Chinese government also stated that all these hundreds of boys and girls shall remain in an unknown place, for an indefinite period of time. Hu Jintao must be immediately arrested by the United Nations, put in jail, and judged by the International Court of Justice, in Hague.
I'm a so-called JuBu, i.e., a proud Jew who happens to practice Buddhism.I bought my first gun at age 59, three months ago. As a long time Zen practitioner we learn to hold two (or more) seemingly paradoxical concepts together and just be with it. Think "Form is Emptiness, Emptiness is Form" or any koan of your choosing. The resolution is kensho or satori, call it what you will. Hindus call it Moksha, Jews D'vekut, Christians Christ Conciousness, etc. Not one, not two. Advaita.So, guns and Buddhism. Just sit with it and the answer will arise.So for me at least, I hold a variety of seemingly paradoxical identities: Jew, Buddhist, Liberal, and 2 nd Amendment Supporter