They were lucky.
"They" being two Snohomish teenagers who accidentally shot themselves last week.
"Details are sketchy about what actually happened, but apparently ‘they were handling the gun and it went off, then one of the kids tried to get the gun and it went off again,’ … ‘It was just a terrible accident.’"
The lucky part is that they’re alive. Too often, such stories end with details regarding funeral arrangements.
I have no idea how these teenagers came by that gun or who may or may not have given it to them.
The fact is they had it and managed to shoot themselves with it.
Now this next part will upset some of you but I’ll say it anyway.
Guns did not cause this accident. They are no more responsible for shootings than knives are for sliced fingers or chainsaws for amputations.
Guns are inanimate objects. They are morally neutral — neither good nor bad. They are tools and, to make one work, you have to attach a human being. Unfortunately — as with knives and chainsaws — the attached human being isn’t always blessed with good sense, training or experience. Thus, there will be times when you read headlines that leave you shaking your head.
Here’s another point. Guns can be kept in homes without blood ever being shed, but it requires care.
Most of us never leave table saws, drill presses or planers running in our workshops. We understand what such can lead to. Still, there are those who do these things.
Most of us never leave electrical outlets uncovered, bottles of bleach in the open, pills on countertops or pots of boiling water near the lip of the stove. We "childproof" our homes to such an extent that even adults have a tough time getting hurt. Still, there are those who ignore such precautions.
The vast majority of gun owners understand the danger of loaded and unsecured firearms and behave accordingly. Unfortunately, there are those who seem to believe that the kids don’t know where loaded guns are hidden and would never handle them if they did.
I’m not saying this is what happened in this case. The facts are not yet in. But for those who do leave loaded and unsecured firearms at home, here’s a question: "What are you thinking?"
In this country, we have the right to own firearms. Along with that right, however, comes the responsibility to see that such firearms are handled and stored safely.
I don’t know how many times it’s been said but here it is again. Guns should be kept unloaded and in a safe (locked) place. Ammunition should be stored separately in a secure place.
If you must have a loaded gun in your home, look around. If you see kids, then you’ve got to ratchet the safety precautions way up. You might consider buying a small combination safe that can be bolted to a table. These can be opened in seconds. Whatever you do, however, it has to be something other than putting the gun on top of the refrigerator, under the mattress or behind the cookbooks.
If you have guns and kids in the house, take curiosity out of the equation. Teach them to shoot. Enroll them in a safety class. Take the class with them. Then, take them shooting so often that they no longer have any desire to "play" with a gun.
One last thing.
If you have a gun in the home and choose to ignore all of the above, please understand the following:
When a gun is fired, physics takes over.
Physics isn’t a good idea, it’s the law.
A bullet has mass. When fired, it acquires velocity. An object with mass and velocity behaves according to a certain formula. That formula says that when the bullet hits something, its mass and velocity will be converted to energy. That energy will be absorbed by whatever the bullet hits.
If the bullet hits a human, that bullet will pulverize whatever gets in its way — kidneys, stomach, heart, lungs, arms, legs, head, whatever.
Too, with guns and bullets, there are no "I take it back’s." There are no "do-overs." There is neither an "Esc" key nor a "CTRL-ALT-DELETE" command.
What there is, if safety and good sense are ignored, is something I never want to be associated with.
This time, though, two teenagers got lucky.
The details are sketchy as to what happened and why, but they’re still alive.
And have hopefully learned a hard lesson — one that many of us can also take to heart.
Larry Simoneaux is a freelance writer living in Edmonds. Comments can be sent to larrysim@att.net.
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