I went to Calfgrit7’s school today for his lunch time. (I decided not to bring up the bullet situation with the office staff, but this “lunch date” was planned before the bullet was found, so this timing was just coincidental.) This is the last lunch at school I’d have with him in first grade — school will be out for this grade in a couple of weeks.

Calfgrit7 was very happy to see me, and he immediately held out his hand to take me with him into the cafeteria and to their class’s tables. They have to sit boy-girl-boy-girl now because both sexes were getting too rowdy when they got together in their groups. The girl sitting beside CG7 was a tiny, little thing with a little Barbie band-aid on her forehead. She showed me her boo-boo rather proudly. Across the table from me was another girl with a pink and purple “Princess” shirt. Beside her was a boy with disheveled hair and half a dozen packs of ketchup to apply to everything on his tray.

The kids are so silly and cute. The two girls with us continuously wanted CG7’s and my attention — we’re just the babe magnets, yes we are. How you doin’?

I snapped a few pictures around the cafeteria because Calfgrit7 won’t be back in this school next year, and I want him to have something to remind him of it if he ever feels nostalgic for his kindergarten and first grade years. I know, I know, he’s only 7. But I wish I had some pictures of my elementary school so I could look back and remember what it looked like when I was there.

That’s the sad thing about nostalgia: you only think of it when it’s too late to record those memories.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

Calfgrit7 got undressed for his bath, and I checked his clothes pockets to make sure nothing “extra” would get in the washing machine. From one pocket I pulled out a bullet. A bullet.

It isn’t a live cartridge, it’s just a spent and deformed bullet.* It’s sliced in half diagonally, and the bottom is slightly smushed into an oval shape. Looking at in my hand, it’s a right good sized caliber; I figured it might be a .44 or .45, but when I checked in on a ruler, it’s at least .50. Its size, the three rings around the bottom, and the hollow base (not the point) made me think it might be a Minié ball. [I just looked up pictures of Minié balls through Google, and now I’m certain this is such.]

Calfgrit7 was excited when I said it was a bullet. I wasn’t upset or anything, I was just surprised. I mean, we’ve found all kinds of things in his pockets over the years, but I didn’t expect to find a bullet. Especially a Civil War-style bullet. (I don’t expect it’s actually from the Civil War.) He said he found it on the playground at school. Wow.

I’m considering taking it to his school office just to let them know what was found. It’s not a big deal in itself, and I don’t expect anything to “be done” about it. But my pointing it out to them might be of use if some other kid finds one or if anything weird or “suspicious” comes up about kids finding bullets on the playground. Who knows, some other kid may find one (one more easily recognizable as a bullet) and show it around to his classmates. I can imagine the uproar that could follow such an event.

Thinking about the potential for things to get blown out of proportion is what makes me think twice about telling the school. I can just see the newspaper headlines, “FIRST GRADER FINDS BULLET ON SCHOOL PLAYGROUND”.

* For those who aren’t familiar with guns and bullets, a bullet is the lead projectile that comes out of the gun. By itself, with no powder and no gun, it is no more dangerous than a small rock.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

Speaking of hunting video games, I’ve been real hunting several times with my late step-dad. He was an avid deer hunter, and when we boys were younger, he often took one of us with him. Although I went with him on occasion, I never came to enjoy hunting — but not for the reason you might first think.

To go deer hunting required that we wake up at 4:00 a.m., in the fall and winter, get dressed, pack up, and drive out to the wilderness of the next county over. I never was a morning person; I never liked getting up two hours before light. I’ve never been a fan of cold weather; I never liked standing patiently in the 25-30 degree climate.

My step-dad would be talking with his fellow hunters over the CB radio, handling his dogs at the back of the truck, standing on the back of the truck, on top of the dog box, scanning the fields for a target. I would usually spend my time sitting in the cab of the pick-up truck half asleep, shivering in the cold. Now, once noon came, and the sun was high and the air was above freezing, I was ready to hunt. Unfortunately, the hunting day was winding down about that time.

Although I went hunting probably over a dozen times in my youth, I never killed a deer. I think I’m the only boy in the family (1 full brother, 3 step brothers) who never did. I’ve shot squirrels, birds, and many paper targets, but I never bagged a deer. I never even fired at a deer. That’s kind of pathetic for a boy growing up in a deer-hunting family.

I’ve seen my step-dad shoot deer. I’ve helped drag carcasses back to the truck, I’ve watched as he cut a deer up, and I’ve carried the fresh meat. I always wanted to shoot a deer (or at least shoot at one). I did have two distinct chances, though, but I failed.

Once, I was hidden in some tall grass and weeds in the middle of an otherwise bare farm field. I had gotten tired of standing in the cold, so I was sitting on the ground. I couldn’t see out of the grass, but I didn’t care. I was cold, tired, and just damned unhappy. I could hear the dogs barking and howling in the woods to the south of the field I was in, but I never see a deer anyway, so I didn’t really pay attention.

Suddenly I heard what sounded like a horse galloping, and then a second later, a deer burst through the grass and weeds. It passed in a zip just three feet beside me — I could have reached out and touched it. It happened so fast, and seemingly out of the blue, that I just jumped and gave a shout. I was so surprised and startled that I didn’t realize what had happened for another couple seconds. By the time my mind had registered the event, I saw the deer bound into the woods on the other side of the field. My shotgun was still lying on the ground.

The other time, I was sulking in the pick-up truck, hating the cold and early morning. We were parked in an empty field on one side of a big, long dirt windbreak (about 10′ high). My step-dad was standing a few yards behind the truck listening to the dogs in the distance.

Someone several hundred yards away, on the other side of the big mound fired a shot. The pick-up truck rocked as my step-dad leaped up onto the back. I was fully alert by then, and getting out of the cab.

Three deer ran around the end of the dirt mound, maybe 30 yards in front of the truck. There I was, standing ready with my shotgun in my hands. I threw the gun to my shoulder, leveled the barrel on the lead deer — I could see it’s antlers — and aimed for a moment, then squeezed the trigger. Nothing. I squeezed again. Nothing.

Just as the deer jumped into some tall brush, I heard the boom from my step-dad’s rifle behind and above me. He fired three times but I couldn’t see the targets from my level, standing on the ground.

What the hell had happened? I checked my gun and realized I had forgotten to turn off the safety. Dammit. You have got to be kidding me, I thought.

My step-dad had killed one of the deer, and I helped him bring it back out of the brush. I was pumped up on adrenaline for a long time, even forgetting about the cold for a while. But once I had come down from the excitement, I was so very disappointed.

That was the last time I went deer hunting.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

I was driving the car, and Calfgrit7 was in the back seat, when all of a sudden I hear, “Fwup. Aayy!” I looked in my rearview mirror and saw this:

It had rained a couple days before this, so I had an umbrella on the floor behind the passenger seat. Calfgrit7 had reached down and picked it up to look at. He apparently pushed the button, and it burst open. The open umbrella filled the whole area behind the front seats, and even when I turned around, I couldn’t see him at all.

The opening startled him, but he got over it quickly. “How do I close it?” he asked. At the next stop light, I tried to help him. With the umbrella open, he couldn’t turn it around and I couldn’t reach around to get at the handle. “We’ll just have to wait till I can get somewhere to park,” I said, chuckling.

Within a minute, before I could get to a parking lot, he had figured out how to close it. But he couldn’t get it to latch and stay shut — it popped open again. We stopped at another traffic light, he closed it again, and I was able to reach back and help him latch it securely.

“Can I open it again?” he asked.

“No,” I said, chuckling again, “not in the car.”

He dropped the umbrella back to the floor and the incident was over. Just one of those little sitcom moments that life with children is full of.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com