Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
there goes another one...
damn, one week after my old elementary school burned down comes the news that my old employer us sugar is selling its thousands of acres of sugar cane fields to the federal/state consortium that is restoring the everglades; a worthwhile project if the corps of engineers can pull off the restoration of the region from lake okeechobee south through the glades and into the keys...that remains to be seen, in the meantime i will still mourn the loss of one of the largest agricultural producers in the nation, along with 1700 jobs and the certain death of several small towns whose only industry is "uncle sugar"...
just another icon of my youth slipping away; i went to work in the bryant mill of us sugar when i was 18 and worked there for five years...by nineteen i was making the average wage of a college graduate, and though i'm glad i moved on, many people in that region work their whole lives for a single company for good pay and benefits...those jobs will be gone and they're not coming back...sad.
"David Guest, a lawyer with the environmental group Earthjustice and a longtime foe of U.S. Sugar, gloated over the announcement. "In the old days, you didn't just beat your opponent, you also ate them," he said. "Today, we're eating U.S. Sugar.""
any wonder i hate most lawyers and treehuggers?...eat this, you cold, heartless, smarmy, self-righteous bastard...
jtc
just another icon of my youth slipping away; i went to work in the bryant mill of us sugar when i was 18 and worked there for five years...by nineteen i was making the average wage of a college graduate, and though i'm glad i moved on, many people in that region work their whole lives for a single company for good pay and benefits...those jobs will be gone and they're not coming back...sad.
"David Guest, a lawyer with the environmental group Earthjustice and a longtime foe of U.S. Sugar, gloated over the announcement. "In the old days, you didn't just beat your opponent, you also ate them," he said. "Today, we're eating U.S. Sugar.""
any wonder i hate most lawyers and treehuggers?...eat this, you cold, heartless, smarmy, self-righteous bastard...
jtc
Sunday, June 15, 2008
a dad's dad...
the 15th anniversary of my dad's passing was this past march, and i wrote a little tribute to him then...there's not much to add except, happy father's day, Dad...i love you and i miss you!
http://poetnthepawnbroker.blogspot.com/2008/03/i-cant-believe-its-been-fifteen-years.html
jtc
http://poetnthepawnbroker.blogspot.com/2008/03/i-cant-believe-its-been-fifteen-years.html
jtc
Saturday, June 14, 2008
tonight on cops...
tonight's 8pm episode of cops has a bunch of freshfaced deputies tracking down (with a copter and a dog) a guy who had just robbed an old couple at gunpoint...in the used car lot next to my old west palm beach pawn shop...
i wrote about that car lot in a post about my first negligent discharge in 1978 as a twentysomething new pawnshop manager...
funny, in the cops episode it's nighttime and the stores are closed but the old ihop across the busy road shows up like a beacon; had many omelets there while i waited to open the store at 9; i also walked out one day without my "manbag", yeah that was the day of curly perms and handbags for guys and i had both...that damn bag had an naa minirevolver, a vintage ladies rolex watch worth a thousand or so, and $700 in cash in it...never saw it again (neither did anyone else, winkwink eddy the manager), and i never carried one again...can't believe i ever did, but disco and a little dope had its effects.
that was thirty years ago and that strip hasn't changed much, don't know exactly when the cops episode was shot but looked pretty recent...the old couple was okay and id'd the lowlife who held a gun to her neck and his forehead; the old guy said he thought he would be shot and he'd been shot at before...in the war...and probably about the time that barrel was vibrating on his forehead he wished he weren't the antigun nyc liberal transplant retiree fron the giant century village conclave down the road that he almost certainly was...what went through his mind when he was sitting there waiting to be dispatched like dog by a lifeless scum right in front of his wife of how many years? and was she next? i wonder if he changed his attitude and voting habits after that little incident?
jtc
i wrote about that car lot in a post about my first negligent discharge in 1978 as a twentysomething new pawnshop manager...
funny, in the cops episode it's nighttime and the stores are closed but the old ihop across the busy road shows up like a beacon; had many omelets there while i waited to open the store at 9; i also walked out one day without my "manbag", yeah that was the day of curly perms and handbags for guys and i had both...that damn bag had an naa minirevolver, a vintage ladies rolex watch worth a thousand or so, and $700 in cash in it...never saw it again (neither did anyone else, winkwink eddy the manager), and i never carried one again...can't believe i ever did, but disco and a little dope had its effects.
that was thirty years ago and that strip hasn't changed much, don't know exactly when the cops episode was shot but looked pretty recent...the old couple was okay and id'd the lowlife who held a gun to her neck and his forehead; the old guy said he thought he would be shot and he'd been shot at before...in the war...and probably about the time that barrel was vibrating on his forehead he wished he weren't the antigun nyc liberal transplant retiree fron the giant century village conclave down the road that he almost certainly was...what went through his mind when he was sitting there waiting to be dispatched like dog by a lifeless scum right in front of his wife of how many years? and was she next? i wonder if he changed his attitude and voting habits after that little incident?
jtc
boomboom!
11:15 this a.m., standing on the front porch with wifey discussing her landscaping when a sharp double boom lifted me off my feet...i had known the shuttle was due back in fla today but feeling that sonic thump always catches me by surprise; it really seems like a physical force, like a roofer throwing a square of shingles down on the roof.
and that shuttle might be just a bus, but it's an f'n space bus, and it impresses the hell out of me...the future of earth has to involve unearthly exploits and all this experience has got to be a good thing for our kids and grandkids to build on.
jtc
and that shuttle might be just a bus, but it's an f'n space bus, and it impresses the hell out of me...the future of earth has to involve unearthly exploits and all this experience has got to be a good thing for our kids and grandkids to build on.
jtc
Friday, June 13, 2008
nurse and nurture...protect and provide...
munchkin wrangler's chafing from ignorant assumptions about his chosen parental role...
no need for that, though...
nurse and nurture...protect and provide...
there’s a lot of depth and meaning in those four words when it comes to the functions of a real parent…culture mostly attaches the more obvious implications of the two former to mothers and the two latter to fathers, and so do i.
thank God, men and women are different and differently equipped, so i have no problem acknowledging that some of the literal meanings of nursing and nurturing are best left to women, and vice versa that some natural and/or archaic functions of protecting and providing are the chosen/assigned domain of most men.
but if nurturing also means being allowed the honor helping my children grow their souls, and nursing means holding them through the night to take away their pain, then count me in on that…those experiences were among the most gratifying of my life.
and if protecting means my wife’s vigilance over our kids like a lionness, (do not get between her and her kids!), and providing means imbuing to them the love, hope, devotion, courage, and strength that she is made of, then that is her role as well.
external expectations aside, who does what doesn’t matter much, but that it gets done…for the children as well as for ourselves, because it's really the same thing; there's not a me, you, and them in a family but just an us...
and fulfillment will come naturally from within…it is wonderful, you will miss it when it is gone but the rewards will last you and your children a lifetime.
jtc
no need for that, though...
nurse and nurture...protect and provide...
there’s a lot of depth and meaning in those four words when it comes to the functions of a real parent…culture mostly attaches the more obvious implications of the two former to mothers and the two latter to fathers, and so do i.
thank God, men and women are different and differently equipped, so i have no problem acknowledging that some of the literal meanings of nursing and nurturing are best left to women, and vice versa that some natural and/or archaic functions of protecting and providing are the chosen/assigned domain of most men.
but if nurturing also means being allowed the honor helping my children grow their souls, and nursing means holding them through the night to take away their pain, then count me in on that…those experiences were among the most gratifying of my life.
and if protecting means my wife’s vigilance over our kids like a lionness, (do not get between her and her kids!), and providing means imbuing to them the love, hope, devotion, courage, and strength that she is made of, then that is her role as well.
external expectations aside, who does what doesn’t matter much, but that it gets done…for the children as well as for ourselves, because it's really the same thing; there's not a me, you, and them in a family but just an us...
and fulfillment will come naturally from within…it is wonderful, you will miss it when it is gone but the rewards will last you and your children a lifetime.
jtc
a lucky day...
i've had some of my best days on friday the thirteenth...
happy birthday to my grandson j.r at age nineteen...
happy birthday to my grandson j.r at age nineteen...
Monday, June 9, 2008
happy birthday to the best woman in the world!
today is mybaby's fifty fourth birthday....for about three months she'll be a year older than me, a fact i point out a lot as i look like i'm twenty years older...
how can she look like this after thirty six years of putting up with me and raising three good kids who now have four kids of their own? beats me...but i thank God every day that she stuck around.
she's down at the florida house after attending kindergarten graduation for Grace (that's her with Nana on facepaint day) and i'm getting my son ready to move back down there after three years here in north georgia; i'll be heading down t0morrow and we'll have a nice birthday cookout for her then.
i miss you baby, and i'll see you soon...love, me.
Friday, June 6, 2008
norman d day...
-------------
blessed are they
who came here to lay
down their lives to entreat us.
their crosses may've stayed
but their souls flew 'way
with God to keep us and greet us.
and come our own day,
we'll be able to say...
we thank you! we love you! you freed us!
jtc
blessed are they
who came here to lay
down their lives to entreat us.
their crosses may've stayed
but their souls flew 'way
with God to keep us and greet us.
and come our own day,
we'll be able to say...
we thank you! we love you! you freed us!
jtc
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
so, it looks like bo or mac...sigh...
well, it looks like it's down to obama or mccain...and while i can't say that mccain inspires me or impresses me, obama does...just listen to him talk and you'll believe he is the chosen one!
but i'll tell you this, and nothing else really matters...
i have to think that iraq is (was) more of a vacuum than a sieve, and that our mission there, while p.c. couched in humanitarianism, is the chosen stage to draw, divert, and deplete the resources, concentration, and planning of the region’s terrorists, who would much rather be suicide-bombing sites in dc, nyc, london, and tel aviv…
judgement and criticism of this endeavor is above my need-to-know…at some point we must trust in the good intentions and expertise of those we have chosen to (at least for now) guide our ship…and while the captain and crew are employed by us the paying passengers, what we are paying for, it is hoped, is knowledge and experience and they should not be micromanaged by their employers. history will arbit the place of ghwb in its archives, as it also will for bho if and when he reaches the end of his term…
but if it is knowledge and experience we pay our “figurehead” for, i can’t see the bang for the buck with bo…if it is good intentions we value most, we need look no further than 1976-1980 to realize how worthless they can be on the world stage without also commanding the respect and at least the perception of willingness and capability to use force to protect us and ours,… and it is those very military and intelligence agencies you reference which failed on such a monumental, top-down scale until the reagan adminstration turned that perception around.
and while i am no bush apologist and remain unconvinced that the chosen theater will prove to have been the correct strategy (the actual costs in all guises will not be known for a generation), i am convinced that if “change” in our worldwide vision, strategy, and presence is required, i would like a “figurehead” who can do more than say it, howevery earnestly, and convincingly, he may do so.
jtc
but i'll tell you this, and nothing else really matters...
i have to think that iraq is (was) more of a vacuum than a sieve, and that our mission there, while p.c. couched in humanitarianism, is the chosen stage to draw, divert, and deplete the resources, concentration, and planning of the region’s terrorists, who would much rather be suicide-bombing sites in dc, nyc, london, and tel aviv…
judgement and criticism of this endeavor is above my need-to-know…at some point we must trust in the good intentions and expertise of those we have chosen to (at least for now) guide our ship…and while the captain and crew are employed by us the paying passengers, what we are paying for, it is hoped, is knowledge and experience and they should not be micromanaged by their employers. history will arbit the place of ghwb in its archives, as it also will for bho if and when he reaches the end of his term…
but if it is knowledge and experience we pay our “figurehead” for, i can’t see the bang for the buck with bo…if it is good intentions we value most, we need look no further than 1976-1980 to realize how worthless they can be on the world stage without also commanding the respect and at least the perception of willingness and capability to use force to protect us and ours,… and it is those very military and intelligence agencies you reference which failed on such a monumental, top-down scale until the reagan adminstration turned that perception around.
and while i am no bush apologist and remain unconvinced that the chosen theater will prove to have been the correct strategy (the actual costs in all guises will not be known for a generation), i am convinced that if “change” in our worldwide vision, strategy, and presence is required, i would like a “figurehead” who can do more than say it, howevery earnestly, and convincingly, he may do so.
jtc
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
my melancholy babies...
marko at the munchkin wrangler has a post extolling the simple, wondrous pleasures of fatherhood, of sharing the innocence that is your flesh and blood experiencing the world for the very first time.
that quickly took me back and before you know it, my response had become it's own bittersweet post...
marko:
my son, my youngest child with two older sisters, is now 24 years old and a business owner.
20 years ago when he was four, i sold my pawn store and took a year off before starting a new one…i spent that year almost fulltime with my son, and that time is now one of the most cherished memories of my life.
in 1988 video cameras were a cutting-edge novelty, and i took one home from the pawnshop, about the size of a small suitcase…and during the year that i spent with eric, the last year before school took over as his main focus and influence, i took snippets of video of my beautiful son and me…
he amazed me with his depth of understanding, of love, of empathy...i had some of the deepest and most soulful conversations of my life with a four year old child.
a few minutes of video driving our little suzuki samurai around the sand trails near our home…eric shooting my old childhood .22 with me filming and doing dumbass olympics competition commentary…him learning to ride a bike without training wheels around the baseball diamond…us swimming and talking in nearby lake jackson and throwing a tennis ball for our two loyal cur dogs…watching a wading bird spear and swallow a good-sized water snake…and eric steering the little samurai along the lakeshore all by himself, with the suzuki creeping along in double-low 4×4 and me walking alongside, again doing dopey voiceovers…
how could i have known that this one vhs videotape, which also includes footage of my sweet daughters at Christmastime that same year…would be the only one we ever made?…the camcorder is a pain to carry around and ends up sitting on the shelf, you’ll always film the next event or get together, and before you know it…
before you know it and in the blink of an eye…twenty years have passed, and you sit with your wife now and then, and watch that old video, and feel the most awesome sense of love, and melancholy, and sadness…and pride.
it sounds corny...but my friend, embrace, and cherish,...and record...the moment and the feeling...it's gone before you can turn around, and it's never coming back.
jtc
that quickly took me back and before you know it, my response had become it's own bittersweet post...
marko:
my son, my youngest child with two older sisters, is now 24 years old and a business owner.
20 years ago when he was four, i sold my pawn store and took a year off before starting a new one…i spent that year almost fulltime with my son, and that time is now one of the most cherished memories of my life.
in 1988 video cameras were a cutting-edge novelty, and i took one home from the pawnshop, about the size of a small suitcase…and during the year that i spent with eric, the last year before school took over as his main focus and influence, i took snippets of video of my beautiful son and me…
he amazed me with his depth of understanding, of love, of empathy...i had some of the deepest and most soulful conversations of my life with a four year old child.
a few minutes of video driving our little suzuki samurai around the sand trails near our home…eric shooting my old childhood .22 with me filming and doing dumbass olympics competition commentary…him learning to ride a bike without training wheels around the baseball diamond…us swimming and talking in nearby lake jackson and throwing a tennis ball for our two loyal cur dogs…watching a wading bird spear and swallow a good-sized water snake…and eric steering the little samurai along the lakeshore all by himself, with the suzuki creeping along in double-low 4×4 and me walking alongside, again doing dopey voiceovers…
how could i have known that this one vhs videotape, which also includes footage of my sweet daughters at Christmastime that same year…would be the only one we ever made?…the camcorder is a pain to carry around and ends up sitting on the shelf, you’ll always film the next event or get together, and before you know it…
before you know it and in the blink of an eye…twenty years have passed, and you sit with your wife now and then, and watch that old video, and feel the most awesome sense of love, and melancholy, and sadness…and pride.
it sounds corny...but my friend, embrace, and cherish,...and record...the moment and the feeling...it's gone before you can turn around, and it's never coming back.
jtc
Sunday, June 1, 2008
Saturday, May 31, 2008
road test report!
picked up the "smart" car yesterday down at the buckhead dealership in atlanta...
the goofy little thing is actually kind of a blast to drive, as possible with a 3-cylinder 70-hp engine...the autoshifting tranny takes some getting used to, but with paddle shifters can be fun; the thing even has a little bit of an old mg type sports car sound, and it really does handle highway speeds well...seventy mph on i-85/i-75 at rush hour was no big deal, and this thing gets more looks and questions from people than anything i've driven in a while, and that includes some pretty cool rides.
so, anyway, the ebay auction starts tonight...my actual cost including sales tax, etc. was around 15,500 and the most recent ebay sales have been about 3k over that, so looks like i'll make a buck and that's a good thing.
i may go ahead and put in an order for another one...it'll take another year to get it, and by then maybe the motorhome can come back out of mothballs and we'll use the smart as a dinghy...
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
free money...
about a year ago i read about a mercedes-built minicar that has been running around the streets of europe for several years and that they were prepping for the US market...
ordinarily, a car not much bigger than a golf cart wouldn't have me looking twice due to the inherent safety issues...but this mercedes designed "smart" car was built like a roll cage with multiple airbags, etc., and tested very well by the crash-safety folks...and it comes loaded with a/c, cd player, skid-control, and a lot of other equipment not usually found on a minicar small enough to park sideways in a standard parking space...and with a 3-cylinder engine that pushes it up to 90 mph while still getting mileage in the forties, it looked like a good prospect to pull behind our motorhome; most cars with automatic trans. have to be pulled on a trailer or dolly, but this one was designed to be pulled with all four wheels on the ground.
the program called for placing a $99 deposit, ordering the car the way you want it, and when they're available, they contact you...so since the deposit was refundable if i changed my mind, i ordered one...and i admit that the prospect of something new and different (think new beetle and mini-cooper) generating a profit due to supply/demand did occur to me.
well, then the price of gas started shooting up instead of just climbing, and we've about decided not to use the motorhome this summer for a long trip as planned...it holds about seventy gallons, and with the ford v-10 engine gets seven or eight mpg...every hundred miles would cost about $60 in gas alone...yikes.
so when the dealer in atlanta contacted us last week to let us know our all-black smart car was being delivered, i checked out ebay to see if the prius crowd et al would pay a premium to get the little car now instead of getting on the year-plus waiting list.
turns out it should bring 2500-3000 over our actual cost after including everything, so what the hell, instead of cancelling my order and getting my $99 back (and letting somebody else buy the car), i'm driving up this week to pick it up and flip it on ebay to make a buck...
i've never been one to leave free money on the table, and if i decide i want a smart for myself i can wait till the fever dies down bringing the price down with it as the supply catches up...in the meantime, i wish i'd of reserved a dozen of 'em...i'll take all those yuppies' dollars that i can get!
Monday, May 26, 2008
thank you...
on this memorial day 2008, my humblest most heartfelt thank you to all who serve and have served and sacrificed...you have saved and continue to save the world from those who would destroy it and us...may God bless you, us, the USA, and the world...
Monday, May 12, 2008
i got a "free" gun today...
i'm looking at a nice little surprise sitting next to me right now...a smith and wesson sigma sw9f pistol...and it was free!
well, not really...about seven years ago on 8/27/01, the day before my 47th birthday and two weeks before the 9/11 attacks, i took this pistol and a couple of cameras into pawn for $400; the customer, a setup contractor for mobile homes, had a 60 day option to buy his stuff back or extend the option. he had done some business with me in the past, buying tools, a necklace for his wife, and had done a few other pawns to pay his help, etc., and he always got his stuff back when he collected on a contract...routine transactions, a good customer, i had many like him.
but this time, with just a few days before his buyback option would expire, i hadn't heard from him...then i got a call from the local agent of the florida department of law enforcement, the fdle. it seems my gentle customer was pretty involved in a smuggling ring on the side; he was in custody and wouldn't be getting out soon...now jon at fdle was an acquaintance, so this was not adversarial at all, but jon had gotten notice through the detailed info that pawnshops file with law enforcement that the customer had pawned the pistol...and they could add a felony charge by showing that the guy was in possession of a functioning pistol, so they needed to take the gun and test fire it. so on 10/26/01 i was given a property receipt stating the gun would be returned to me when it was no longer needed as evidence. included with the gun when i got it back is a plastic zip bag holding two shell casings and marked "test fire, 10/28/01", and jons initials. then there is a receipt dated 10/30/01 turning the everything over to the feds (they sent two atf guys over 100 miles from west palm beach to pick it up) as evidence.
a couple of times i've had the local police or sheriff's office pick up a firearm for test firing and i had them back in a few days, but the state and fed involvement was different; i expected them to take longer, so no big thing. but after six months i called with the case number and they said we're still working on it...then after another six months i got the same answer...and after another year the same, so i'm figuring the gun is lost, stolen, or in some agent's collection. then when i gave up my ffl in 2003 and turned in my records to atf, i came across the receipt again and just tossed it; my gun records showed the dated disposition to fdle.
now i don't know if there's any connection between how this case was handled and 9/11, nor do i know if my ffl records got reviewed and the atf followed up with fdle, all i do know is that last week clint, who bought my pawn shop in '06 and kept the same phone number, got a call from the current local fdle agent who said they had concluded their use of the pistol, and how could they reach me to have me pick it up?
so friday i called and talked to the agent (a new guy; jon retired a few years ago)who was very likable, we talked about the crazy amount of time (he thinks the bad guy was getting out of prison, and that caused a review of the files and evidence), and the fact that if they couldn't reach me, the pistol would go to the sheriff's office evidence unit to be melted into manhole covers as is required by florida law. i told him my old friend tom is head of csi at the s.o. and he would have seen my name and tried to contact me before melting day. i also related that tom had told me the stories of transporting van loads of guns to the smelting plant in south florida where he had to personally watch unclaimed guns, which he said were mostly junkers but had also included fine colts, brownings, etc, as they went up the conveyor and into the furnace. the fdle guy said sarcastically how those inanimate objects had to be put to death so they couldn't hurt anybody...damn, he's one of us, which by the way, many of the cops i dealt with over the years were.
so the guy said he would be out of the office on monday, but he would give the gun and necessary papers to the secretary to give to me when i came in on monday. about two in the afternoon i drove to the local fdle office, showed my id to the lady there, signed the property receipt, and left with my little blue plastic box, still sealed with fdle tape...now i didn't really remember much about the gun, actually i had thought it was a ruger p89, so imagine my surprise when i peeled off the tape, opened the box, and found the little smith in perfect condition; it even looked like they had oiled it and wiped it down when it was sealed...which by the way, as marked on the tamperproof tape, was in 2003; probably after the trial. the original owner's manual, 16rd magazine, and chamber safety plug were even there.
so why in the hell did it take almost five additional years for them to contact me about returning the gun? who knows, it's just indicative of how efficient our cj system is, i guess...but i had written this off as a loss long ago, had even forgotten about it, so to me this is a free gun! ...but this is s&w's version of a glock, and i'm not real fond of the plastics personally...so i wish this was a nice 686 or some such...but you know what, i've been wanting one of those new ruger .380 keltec copies, so i'm gonna take this sigma to clint and have him sell it; that should bring me enough for the ruger (those things are still scarce to find at the wholesalers).
so hey, a new free gun, (kind of)...all's well that ends well, yes?
jtc
well, not really...about seven years ago on 8/27/01, the day before my 47th birthday and two weeks before the 9/11 attacks, i took this pistol and a couple of cameras into pawn for $400; the customer, a setup contractor for mobile homes, had a 60 day option to buy his stuff back or extend the option. he had done some business with me in the past, buying tools, a necklace for his wife, and had done a few other pawns to pay his help, etc., and he always got his stuff back when he collected on a contract...routine transactions, a good customer, i had many like him.
but this time, with just a few days before his buyback option would expire, i hadn't heard from him...then i got a call from the local agent of the florida department of law enforcement, the fdle. it seems my gentle customer was pretty involved in a smuggling ring on the side; he was in custody and wouldn't be getting out soon...now jon at fdle was an acquaintance, so this was not adversarial at all, but jon had gotten notice through the detailed info that pawnshops file with law enforcement that the customer had pawned the pistol...and they could add a felony charge by showing that the guy was in possession of a functioning pistol, so they needed to take the gun and test fire it. so on 10/26/01 i was given a property receipt stating the gun would be returned to me when it was no longer needed as evidence. included with the gun when i got it back is a plastic zip bag holding two shell casings and marked "test fire, 10/28/01", and jons initials. then there is a receipt dated 10/30/01 turning the everything over to the feds (they sent two atf guys over 100 miles from west palm beach to pick it up) as evidence.
a couple of times i've had the local police or sheriff's office pick up a firearm for test firing and i had them back in a few days, but the state and fed involvement was different; i expected them to take longer, so no big thing. but after six months i called with the case number and they said we're still working on it...then after another six months i got the same answer...and after another year the same, so i'm figuring the gun is lost, stolen, or in some agent's collection. then when i gave up my ffl in 2003 and turned in my records to atf, i came across the receipt again and just tossed it; my gun records showed the dated disposition to fdle.
now i don't know if there's any connection between how this case was handled and 9/11, nor do i know if my ffl records got reviewed and the atf followed up with fdle, all i do know is that last week clint, who bought my pawn shop in '06 and kept the same phone number, got a call from the current local fdle agent who said they had concluded their use of the pistol, and how could they reach me to have me pick it up?
so friday i called and talked to the agent (a new guy; jon retired a few years ago)who was very likable, we talked about the crazy amount of time (he thinks the bad guy was getting out of prison, and that caused a review of the files and evidence), and the fact that if they couldn't reach me, the pistol would go to the sheriff's office evidence unit to be melted into manhole covers as is required by florida law. i told him my old friend tom is head of csi at the s.o. and he would have seen my name and tried to contact me before melting day. i also related that tom had told me the stories of transporting van loads of guns to the smelting plant in south florida where he had to personally watch unclaimed guns, which he said were mostly junkers but had also included fine colts, brownings, etc, as they went up the conveyor and into the furnace. the fdle guy said sarcastically how those inanimate objects had to be put to death so they couldn't hurt anybody...damn, he's one of us, which by the way, many of the cops i dealt with over the years were.
so the guy said he would be out of the office on monday, but he would give the gun and necessary papers to the secretary to give to me when i came in on monday. about two in the afternoon i drove to the local fdle office, showed my id to the lady there, signed the property receipt, and left with my little blue plastic box, still sealed with fdle tape...now i didn't really remember much about the gun, actually i had thought it was a ruger p89, so imagine my surprise when i peeled off the tape, opened the box, and found the little smith in perfect condition; it even looked like they had oiled it and wiped it down when it was sealed...which by the way, as marked on the tamperproof tape, was in 2003; probably after the trial. the original owner's manual, 16rd magazine, and chamber safety plug were even there.
so why in the hell did it take almost five additional years for them to contact me about returning the gun? who knows, it's just indicative of how efficient our cj system is, i guess...but i had written this off as a loss long ago, had even forgotten about it, so to me this is a free gun! ...but this is s&w's version of a glock, and i'm not real fond of the plastics personally...so i wish this was a nice 686 or some such...but you know what, i've been wanting one of those new ruger .380 keltec copies, so i'm gonna take this sigma to clint and have him sell it; that should bring me enough for the ruger (those things are still scarce to find at the wholesalers).
so hey, a new free gun, (kind of)...all's well that ends well, yes?
jtc
Sunday, May 4, 2008
in pawn...
in 1978 i left my job of five years near lake okeechobee, where i was a sugar mill worker since i was 18...the crew of about a hundred men would refurbish and rebuild the giant mill during the summer, and my job was to help replace, refit, and repair huge steam lines, tanks, pumps, and other equipment...then in november the sugar cane crop starts rolling in and the crew doubles and switches to six months of 24/7 operation of everything from the railroad yard carrying thirty tons of cane per railcar at a clip of 25-30 per hour, to conveyors, giant steam-turbine operated grinding mills (that was my job), with the resulting juice going to evaporator tanks, filters, and pressure cooking pans the size of flying saucers. the thick black granular liquid was then cured in stirring vats, and spun in a bank of centrifugals to seperate the molasses from the dry raw sugar crystals that went straight into boxcars to the refinery or into warehouses where the mountains of golden sugar resembled a moonscape...the waste, or bagasse of the cane stalks was conveyed into and burned in triple boilers that generated steam for all operations plus a power plant with the capacity to run a small town.
this was a union job, and from age 18 till 24 i probably made at least the average yearly income of a four-year college grad...good money to provide for my wife and two daughters which i had by age twenty. but the problem was, this was a pretty coarse bunch of guys, and the bad habits and attitudes were infectious...we are very much products of our environment, and this product wasn't one my wife much cared for. and of course wifey and i were still just 24 and and had already been married 7 years; maybe we needed to see what else there was to the world.
so anyway, even though we lived well, had new cars, and were building a nice house, she left my ass and went back to south georgia for a while. i knew it would be traumatic, but i wanted a change, too; i could look around at guys who had worked for u.s. sugar corp for thirty and forty years, and they were pretty much living the same life as i was, just waiting to retire...not a bad life, but not what you want forever for yourself, your wife, or your kids, really. so i loaded up my tools, cancelled the house (even made some money on that; this was the height of the inflationary boom of the 70s and i flipped the contract for a profit) and i moved to beverly...oh, wait that was jed clampett...no, i loaded up the truck and moved to wpb, west palm beach, that is, just thirty miles and a whole continent away from the rural agricultural region of palm beach county...swimmin' pools, yep, even movie stars, and lots of flashin' lights.
reflecting on a life change as radical as i could handle, i took a duplex apartment that was big enough for the family that i was sure would be back to me in a short time, and answered a couple of help wanted ads in the palm beach post...one was for diebold, the safe and security company that installs bank equipment...hoisting and installing bigass heavy equipment was something i already knew how to do, and they offered a company truck and pretty good wages and benefits; i planned to start the next monday.
but i had noticed another ad, too; for a manager of a pawn shop...and remembered it was on the main road leading into downtown; i drove that way and saw the store, but it didn't look too impressive; i didn't know anything about pawnshops except what most people think they know, which is usually nothing good. plus i already had a good job offer, so i continued through downtown and then over the bridge and across the intracoastal waterway and into palm...beach...proper.
oceanside mansions featuring kennedys, vanderbilts, lots of other old-money names, and even the ultimate new-money name of trump. then a right turn onto the avenue...worth avenue, that runs from the ocean back to the intracoastal, lined with rolls royces, etc.; tiffany, cartier, and all their buds are there, culminating at the end with private yacht clubs with 100ft toys bobbing in the salty breeze...but i digress.
i had planned to drive north along the ocean from palm beach up to the lake worth beach and pier...a great place for bikini watching, and hey, i was single at least for a while...but for some reason, instead i headed back across the intracoastal and past the pawnshop, but this time i pulled in...the pawnshop was nothing like worth avenue, in fact it seemed pretty low-rent to me; but just as i was about to leave, it struck me that the "decor" was by design...shelves might have been cluttered, but over behind the counter was an antique restored slot machine that i knew was valuable; a closer look through the scratched glass of the front showcases revealed not one or two, but at least a dozen rolex watches from $1000 to $5000 (those 5k watches are 20k now)...then a bit further back, four showcases of handguns, all the usual lowend suspects were there, but a whole row of old colts and breakback smiths, the whole line of colt 45's, a dozen or so wood presentation cases holding custom engraved revolvers, and even a set of browning gold-plated renaissance presentation models from the .25 to the mighty hi-power, all with matching numbers...in the back rack among the obligatory cheap .22's and old sears pumps, was a parker double, an anschutz competition rifle, and the first sliding-stock colt ar i had seen in a store...damn...
so i called the number in the ad, and the lady arranged for the owner, she, and i to meet for lunch at a hotel down the road...what unusual people; she a cool, chic, razorsharp jewish american princess who drove a 'vette and was an interior designer...and dick? not the seedy looking little elf i kind of expected but a tall, slim guy with long hair and beard, meticulously groomed, and with penetrating eyes...and only in his thirties. turns out dick had bought out his father-in-law harry (hence d&h pawn) who along with his own father and brothers had been in the pawn business since the 1920's in new york and palm beach...dick had been exposed to and studied and learned from some of the very best dealers, appraisers and collectors in the world of fine jewelry, firearms, coins, paintings and other valuable art and collectibles...there was little that dick didn't know about ancient roman coins, the history and value of fine guns, even 18th century silversmith proofmarks that can make the difference in a set of silver of thousands of dollars.
but dick didn't like to stay in the store...for one thing, he was best at visiting, talking, and consulting with other dealers, including the hotshots in three-piece suits on worth avenue who listened to and respected dick's opinion, and more, they partnered with him on the purchase of large old-money estates, and traded inventory with him so that he had items from these fabulous estates in the unassuming showcase at d&h, and they had access to his knowledge (and money) for big purchases, and also access to his sometimes amazing pawnshop acquisitions...yeah the store was taking tv's, tools, and bicycles in pawn and helping out the little guy till payday...while dick was putting up thousands against the worldly jewels of asset-rich but cash-strapped palm beach socialites with names like dodge...no kidding, the dodge, more on that later.
and so it was that i took the job as manager of dick bergeron's pawnshop in west palm beach at age 24, having spent the five years prior working in the sugar mill just a short distance but worlds away...and the course was set for what would become my life's work in an industry that few understand and even fewer would believe...jtc
this was a union job, and from age 18 till 24 i probably made at least the average yearly income of a four-year college grad...good money to provide for my wife and two daughters which i had by age twenty. but the problem was, this was a pretty coarse bunch of guys, and the bad habits and attitudes were infectious...we are very much products of our environment, and this product wasn't one my wife much cared for. and of course wifey and i were still just 24 and and had already been married 7 years; maybe we needed to see what else there was to the world.
so anyway, even though we lived well, had new cars, and were building a nice house, she left my ass and went back to south georgia for a while. i knew it would be traumatic, but i wanted a change, too; i could look around at guys who had worked for u.s. sugar corp for thirty and forty years, and they were pretty much living the same life as i was, just waiting to retire...not a bad life, but not what you want forever for yourself, your wife, or your kids, really. so i loaded up my tools, cancelled the house (even made some money on that; this was the height of the inflationary boom of the 70s and i flipped the contract for a profit) and i moved to beverly...oh, wait that was jed clampett...no, i loaded up the truck and moved to wpb, west palm beach, that is, just thirty miles and a whole continent away from the rural agricultural region of palm beach county...swimmin' pools, yep, even movie stars, and lots of flashin' lights.
reflecting on a life change as radical as i could handle, i took a duplex apartment that was big enough for the family that i was sure would be back to me in a short time, and answered a couple of help wanted ads in the palm beach post...one was for diebold, the safe and security company that installs bank equipment...hoisting and installing bigass heavy equipment was something i already knew how to do, and they offered a company truck and pretty good wages and benefits; i planned to start the next monday.
but i had noticed another ad, too; for a manager of a pawn shop...and remembered it was on the main road leading into downtown; i drove that way and saw the store, but it didn't look too impressive; i didn't know anything about pawnshops except what most people think they know, which is usually nothing good. plus i already had a good job offer, so i continued through downtown and then over the bridge and across the intracoastal waterway and into palm...beach...proper.
oceanside mansions featuring kennedys, vanderbilts, lots of other old-money names, and even the ultimate new-money name of trump. then a right turn onto the avenue...worth avenue, that runs from the ocean back to the intracoastal, lined with rolls royces, etc.; tiffany, cartier, and all their buds are there, culminating at the end with private yacht clubs with 100ft toys bobbing in the salty breeze...but i digress.
i had planned to drive north along the ocean from palm beach up to the lake worth beach and pier...a great place for bikini watching, and hey, i was single at least for a while...but for some reason, instead i headed back across the intracoastal and past the pawnshop, but this time i pulled in...the pawnshop was nothing like worth avenue, in fact it seemed pretty low-rent to me; but just as i was about to leave, it struck me that the "decor" was by design...shelves might have been cluttered, but over behind the counter was an antique restored slot machine that i knew was valuable; a closer look through the scratched glass of the front showcases revealed not one or two, but at least a dozen rolex watches from $1000 to $5000 (those 5k watches are 20k now)...then a bit further back, four showcases of handguns, all the usual lowend suspects were there, but a whole row of old colts and breakback smiths, the whole line of colt 45's, a dozen or so wood presentation cases holding custom engraved revolvers, and even a set of browning gold-plated renaissance presentation models from the .25 to the mighty hi-power, all with matching numbers...in the back rack among the obligatory cheap .22's and old sears pumps, was a parker double, an anschutz competition rifle, and the first sliding-stock colt ar i had seen in a store...damn...
so i called the number in the ad, and the lady arranged for the owner, she, and i to meet for lunch at a hotel down the road...what unusual people; she a cool, chic, razorsharp jewish american princess who drove a 'vette and was an interior designer...and dick? not the seedy looking little elf i kind of expected but a tall, slim guy with long hair and beard, meticulously groomed, and with penetrating eyes...and only in his thirties. turns out dick had bought out his father-in-law harry (hence d&h pawn) who along with his own father and brothers had been in the pawn business since the 1920's in new york and palm beach...dick had been exposed to and studied and learned from some of the very best dealers, appraisers and collectors in the world of fine jewelry, firearms, coins, paintings and other valuable art and collectibles...there was little that dick didn't know about ancient roman coins, the history and value of fine guns, even 18th century silversmith proofmarks that can make the difference in a set of silver of thousands of dollars.
but dick didn't like to stay in the store...for one thing, he was best at visiting, talking, and consulting with other dealers, including the hotshots in three-piece suits on worth avenue who listened to and respected dick's opinion, and more, they partnered with him on the purchase of large old-money estates, and traded inventory with him so that he had items from these fabulous estates in the unassuming showcase at d&h, and they had access to his knowledge (and money) for big purchases, and also access to his sometimes amazing pawnshop acquisitions...yeah the store was taking tv's, tools, and bicycles in pawn and helping out the little guy till payday...while dick was putting up thousands against the worldly jewels of asset-rich but cash-strapped palm beach socialites with names like dodge...no kidding, the dodge, more on that later.
and so it was that i took the job as manager of dick bergeron's pawnshop in west palm beach at age 24, having spent the five years prior working in the sugar mill just a short distance but worlds away...and the course was set for what would become my life's work in an industry that few understand and even fewer would believe...jtc
Saturday, April 26, 2008
a belated tag...
having been tagged by c-tone for the meme making the rounds whereby one is to:
1. Pick up the nearest book of 123 pages or more. No cheating!
2. Find page 123.
3. Find the first five sentences.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people
but having previously responded to tam's non-tag thusly:
"well, i won't do the tag thing, but here is my entry, from a rather contemporary work; wonder if any of your correspondents recognize it?:
"Yeah, I know. Some of my book club friends would agree with my pick,
but there are plenty who consider him too mainstream, whatever the hell that is.
I guess they had to suffer The Road Not Taken one too many times in high
school.”
jtc
11:27 AM, April 24, 2008"
and in a later response:
"for those wondering about my entry, it is from "a bettered life" by marko kloos...i said "contemporary" because it was finished and published online just a few days ago.
it was closest to me because it was downloaded to my laptop which was ummm...on my lap of course, when i first read tam's self-tagged meme.
if you haven't read it, do yourself a favor and go to munchkin wrangler's blog where you can download it for free...unless you want to do the right thing and toss a buck or twenty into the tip jar...a very pleasant casual read; worth your time and worth paying for if you want to see more...jtc
6:18 PM, April 25, 2008"
so, i have fulfilled the first four parts of the meme, but i'm not much for tagging others, but thanks c-tone, i hope others will be inspired to download and read marko kloos' work.
1. Pick up the nearest book of 123 pages or more. No cheating!
2. Find page 123.
3. Find the first five sentences.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people
but having previously responded to tam's non-tag thusly:
"well, i won't do the tag thing, but here is my entry, from a rather contemporary work; wonder if any of your correspondents recognize it?:
"Yeah, I know. Some of my book club friends would agree with my pick,
but there are plenty who consider him too mainstream, whatever the hell that is.
I guess they had to suffer The Road Not Taken one too many times in high
school.”
jtc
11:27 AM, April 24, 2008"
and in a later response:
"for those wondering about my entry, it is from "a bettered life" by marko kloos...i said "contemporary" because it was finished and published online just a few days ago.
it was closest to me because it was downloaded to my laptop which was ummm...on my lap of course, when i first read tam's self-tagged meme.
if you haven't read it, do yourself a favor and go to munchkin wrangler's blog where you can download it for free...unless you want to do the right thing and toss a buck or twenty into the tip jar...a very pleasant casual read; worth your time and worth paying for if you want to see more...jtc
6:18 PM, April 25, 2008"
so, i have fulfilled the first four parts of the meme, but i'm not much for tagging others, but thanks c-tone, i hope others will be inspired to download and read marko kloos' work.
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
it's all greek to me...
today, april 23rd, marks the death of william shakespeare...he was actually a year younger than me when he died at age 52...
beyond his astounding contribution to literature and performance art, most of us incorporate truisms and metaphors into our daily discourse without even realizing the source...the work of the bard from four...hundred...years...ago...
amazing...
beyond his astounding contribution to literature and performance art, most of us incorporate truisms and metaphors into our daily discourse without even realizing the source...the work of the bard from four...hundred...years...ago...
amazing...
Sunday, April 20, 2008
negligent discharge number one, 1978...
the story of the airline pilot who accidentally discharged his .40 cal. handgun right through his airliner's fuselage while on landing approach to charlotte, nc airport had me wondering what the hell set of circumstances could cause, or rather allow, such an "accident"...utter idiocy and/or failure to abide by one or more of the rules? that was my first thought, and though there are indications of a series of contributing factors, that still is my thinking on where ultimate responsibility lies...then i remembered that the airline pilot involved is not alone; i join him in culpability for potentially tragic lapses of concentration, focus, and control.
then, of course, anyone who enjoys or deals with firearms and has handled a large number of them (and conversely, anyone who is a novice handler and therefore subject to mistakes of inexperience) knows that mistakes can and do happen; in my experience it is virtually always a case of lapsed concentration, judgement, or control; and any one of those, at any time, can be catastrophic...that airline pilot and everyone on that plane, possibly even everyone on the ground in that vicinity, are extremely fortunate that there was no injury, loss of life, or loss of many lives.
and, well...i'm pretty fortunate, too...over a thirty year career of buying, selling, pawning, shooting, collecting, inspecting, cleaning, and repairing firearms, i by necessity was responsible for thousands of them, and the odds were that some mistakes would be made, and they were, three of which resulted in negligent discharges (believe me, you don't forget them) and i, like that pilot, am incredibly thankful that no one was hurt because of my stupid lapses...and for that i thank God; among the many blessing He has bestowed on me, that one ranks near the very top...i have promised to post the details of my three nd's in seperate posts, so, as promised and without further adieu, here is...
negligent discharge number one, 1978...
a future post i will call "in pawn" will describe how i ended up...well, in pawn in '78, with no experience at all in the activities of a pawnshop, as the 24 year old manager of one...the point here is, i'd been the "manager" there for a couple of weeks; in other words i had learned to handle the payments and pickups of people's stuff that they had borrowed money on...and i had learned a little about buying and selling gold and silver by weight, how to tell the real stuff, etc...and i had spent a fair amount of time checking out the wide-ranging firearms inventory; i enjoyed shooting and had always had a few guns, even sold some in my first teenage job at an old fashioned hardware store (anybody remember pre '68?)...
so i guess dick felt comfortable with me at the shop and him doing what he did best...in and out of the shop half a dozen times during the day, checking on things, meeting people to look at goods, and always dropping off a few things for the store to sell that he had picked up on his rounds at other dealers and stores...this was a tightknit group that had known each other for years and they often consigned merchandise to each other valued well into the thousands on a handshake...and sometimes what dick dropped off was a gun or two. and that's what he did on this day...
he was in and out in a rush, and told me he dropped a few things on the desk in his office, so later i went in to check out what he had brought that i would later be entering into stock for sale...and the first thing i noticed was the signature short blue box of a snub-barrel smith and wesson revolver...lots of people think the assault weapons ban of the early 90's was the first of its kind, but 1978 was the middle of the carter years; there was much talk and everyone believed that snub barrel handguns would be banned from private sale...s&w was not producing any at the time, and the wholesalers were all out of stock, so if a dealer was going to have them in his showcase, he had to find them from other dealers and from the public..."short blue boxes"...they were a prize find because inside was going to be an s&w snubbie, and they would bring more then (a clean mo. 60 in box retailed for $500) than they do thirty years later.
so on dick's desk was this short blue box, and i gingerly opened it to find that beautiful brown waxed paper, the book and original tools...unwrapping it quickly to see what prize was inside, i found a shrouded-hammer model, i cannot remember if it was a mo. 38 or 49, it was one or the other; they are of course the same except that m38 is a lightweight, and they both have a spur hammer barely protruding above the shroud, and the gun had been left in hammer-back (cocked) mode...anyway i picked it up and noticing the hammer position...absent mindedly decocked the hammer...by pulling the trigger.
why? to this day i don't know...when i handled the guns in the showcase, and of course when a customer brought any gun in or touched one of ours, the first thing i would do is drop the cylinder and check and/or clear the chamber...and clear it again on every subsequent touch. why did i not do it this time? i still don't know, i do remember that i was on the phone and a bit distracted, and probably when i couldn't release the cylinder i noticed the hammer-back position and dropped the hammer so i could then release the cylinder...talk about backward. obviously the gun should not have been loaded in the box and certainly shouldn't have been cocked, but there is no excuse for what i did; had i followed my own rules (the same as the four rules, even though i hadn't officially heard of the 4r's before), what happened next could not have happened...all i remember is an explosion that deafened me and shocked my senses...and momentarily froze time and consciousness.
when i regained my wits and realized what had happened, and that the gun was fully loaded, fear gripped me like my chest was caught in a vise...the gun had been pointed at the office wall and on the other side of that wall was a used car lot that was always busy; dear God i might have killed someone...i walked to the wall and saw the small entry hole in the wood panelling...about an inch below a window. the exterior wall was concrete block, and that had stopped the .38 slug cold...i looked out the window and as usual there were several people...including a family with children...wandering around the car lot.
i started thanking God then, and i've never stopped yet in thirty years, that the aim wasn't a few inches higher...almost certainly i would have killed an innocent person, maybe even a child, ending or ruining a life, and altering many others including my own and my family's, forever.
it was a lesson in just how fragile our lives are, how one stupid, thoughtless action can turn the world upside down...it's a lesson i never forgot and never will, and i have not repeated it in the thousands of times i have picked up a strange firearm for the first time.
but that is not to say that i didn't commit other stupid acts that are in retrospect, different but just as potentially horrific...even more so really...there would be two more negligent discharges to haunt me, the next one coming fourteen years later, in 1992...and that will be the subject of another post.
then, of course, anyone who enjoys or deals with firearms and has handled a large number of them (and conversely, anyone who is a novice handler and therefore subject to mistakes of inexperience) knows that mistakes can and do happen; in my experience it is virtually always a case of lapsed concentration, judgement, or control; and any one of those, at any time, can be catastrophic...that airline pilot and everyone on that plane, possibly even everyone on the ground in that vicinity, are extremely fortunate that there was no injury, loss of life, or loss of many lives.
and, well...i'm pretty fortunate, too...over a thirty year career of buying, selling, pawning, shooting, collecting, inspecting, cleaning, and repairing firearms, i by necessity was responsible for thousands of them, and the odds were that some mistakes would be made, and they were, three of which resulted in negligent discharges (believe me, you don't forget them) and i, like that pilot, am incredibly thankful that no one was hurt because of my stupid lapses...and for that i thank God; among the many blessing He has bestowed on me, that one ranks near the very top...i have promised to post the details of my three nd's in seperate posts, so, as promised and without further adieu, here is...
negligent discharge number one, 1978...
a future post i will call "in pawn" will describe how i ended up...well, in pawn in '78, with no experience at all in the activities of a pawnshop, as the 24 year old manager of one...the point here is, i'd been the "manager" there for a couple of weeks; in other words i had learned to handle the payments and pickups of people's stuff that they had borrowed money on...and i had learned a little about buying and selling gold and silver by weight, how to tell the real stuff, etc...and i had spent a fair amount of time checking out the wide-ranging firearms inventory; i enjoyed shooting and had always had a few guns, even sold some in my first teenage job at an old fashioned hardware store (anybody remember pre '68?)...
so i guess dick felt comfortable with me at the shop and him doing what he did best...in and out of the shop half a dozen times during the day, checking on things, meeting people to look at goods, and always dropping off a few things for the store to sell that he had picked up on his rounds at other dealers and stores...this was a tightknit group that had known each other for years and they often consigned merchandise to each other valued well into the thousands on a handshake...and sometimes what dick dropped off was a gun or two. and that's what he did on this day...
he was in and out in a rush, and told me he dropped a few things on the desk in his office, so later i went in to check out what he had brought that i would later be entering into stock for sale...and the first thing i noticed was the signature short blue box of a snub-barrel smith and wesson revolver...lots of people think the assault weapons ban of the early 90's was the first of its kind, but 1978 was the middle of the carter years; there was much talk and everyone believed that snub barrel handguns would be banned from private sale...s&w was not producing any at the time, and the wholesalers were all out of stock, so if a dealer was going to have them in his showcase, he had to find them from other dealers and from the public..."short blue boxes"...they were a prize find because inside was going to be an s&w snubbie, and they would bring more then (a clean mo. 60 in box retailed for $500) than they do thirty years later.
so on dick's desk was this short blue box, and i gingerly opened it to find that beautiful brown waxed paper, the book and original tools...unwrapping it quickly to see what prize was inside, i found a shrouded-hammer model, i cannot remember if it was a mo. 38 or 49, it was one or the other; they are of course the same except that m38 is a lightweight, and they both have a spur hammer barely protruding above the shroud, and the gun had been left in hammer-back (cocked) mode...anyway i picked it up and noticing the hammer position...absent mindedly decocked the hammer...by pulling the trigger.
why? to this day i don't know...when i handled the guns in the showcase, and of course when a customer brought any gun in or touched one of ours, the first thing i would do is drop the cylinder and check and/or clear the chamber...and clear it again on every subsequent touch. why did i not do it this time? i still don't know, i do remember that i was on the phone and a bit distracted, and probably when i couldn't release the cylinder i noticed the hammer-back position and dropped the hammer so i could then release the cylinder...talk about backward. obviously the gun should not have been loaded in the box and certainly shouldn't have been cocked, but there is no excuse for what i did; had i followed my own rules (the same as the four rules, even though i hadn't officially heard of the 4r's before), what happened next could not have happened...all i remember is an explosion that deafened me and shocked my senses...and momentarily froze time and consciousness.
when i regained my wits and realized what had happened, and that the gun was fully loaded, fear gripped me like my chest was caught in a vise...the gun had been pointed at the office wall and on the other side of that wall was a used car lot that was always busy; dear God i might have killed someone...i walked to the wall and saw the small entry hole in the wood panelling...about an inch below a window. the exterior wall was concrete block, and that had stopped the .38 slug cold...i looked out the window and as usual there were several people...including a family with children...wandering around the car lot.
i started thanking God then, and i've never stopped yet in thirty years, that the aim wasn't a few inches higher...almost certainly i would have killed an innocent person, maybe even a child, ending or ruining a life, and altering many others including my own and my family's, forever.
it was a lesson in just how fragile our lives are, how one stupid, thoughtless action can turn the world upside down...it's a lesson i never forgot and never will, and i have not repeated it in the thousands of times i have picked up a strange firearm for the first time.
but that is not to say that i didn't commit other stupid acts that are in retrospect, different but just as potentially horrific...even more so really...there would be two more negligent discharges to haunt me, the next one coming fourteen years later, in 1992...and that will be the subject of another post.
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