Today, while I was on the road to get some Astragalus from
the local herb store (an odd thing to have in a small town
perhaps, but we do have one) I saw a Suburban truck pulled
off to the side of the road. Naturally, I was paying some
attention to the vehicle, since I needed to make sure to
pass it safely. From afar, I noticed a large person, and
possibly a small person, standing near the vehicle.
As I got closer, I noticed that indeed there was a small
person, being watched over by a larger person; It was a
child and a woman. My eye continued to be drawn to them both
as I passed; they had finished whatever business had caused
them to pull over, and the woman was no reaching in to put
the child back in the vehicle.
As she was buckling her child, I saw that the woman was
wearing nice black pants, a loose-fitting and comfortable-
looking long sleeve taupe shirt, a sun hat, and a semi-
automatic handgun in a Fobus holster on her right-hand side.
From the brief look I got, judging by the size and style,
the gun was most likely a .380. It didn't look like a Glock
or a Ruger; my guess was a S&W or Sig. Of course, it was a
very brief look, and the gun could have been anything. But
it was most certainly a semi-automatic gun in a Fobus-style
(but I'm betting Fobus brand) holster.
I experienced no feelings of alarm, shock, or surprise, nor
any other unpleasant feelings. Here in Arizona, anyone can
carry a gun almost anywhere, and many people do. I see guns
at the grocery store, at the lake, and all about town. I
know people who carry concealed at church (they choose to
conceal so as not to distract, I believe.)
The laws are so permissive, in fact, that I could carry a
semi-automatic rifle on my back (or front-carry I suppose)
and a handgun at each side, walking down the road, and still
be within my rights. It's another subject, but I could also
carry a sword (in fact, we used to have a homeless man that
carried a Katana around town. The police were always having
some kind of talk with him, as he made people uncomfortable,
but that's all another story.)
(As a side note I'll add that you see almost zero long-gun
carriers, even though it is legal here. Perhaps it's because
it's not at all easy to lug around a long-gun. That makes
the most sense. I would probably curious, at least, if I
saw someone carrying around a long-gun on their back, but I
don't think I'd feel any fear about it unless they were
acting in a concerning way.)
In the years I've lived in this part of Arizona, I've never
witnessed any violence involving guns that was caused by
locals. There was a shooting here in town last year, but it
was an out-of-town gentleman who was holed up in a house
in some drug-related deal. The police were called for a
welfare check by his mother, and when they showed up he
started shooting. The officer was hurt; the man barracaded
himself in and shot himself. It's a small town, and I heard
the shots from my house.
A couple years ago there was another shooting, again by an
out-of-towner, this one with a long criminal history
including yearly arrests and two prison sentences. A weak
criminal justice system let him walk free after violent and
drug-related crimes, until he shot and killed an officer in
a nearby city. He fled to my town, took a hostage, and held
her for 6 hours while shooting occassionally at the police.
He was eventually shot in the standoff, and died from his
wounds; the hostage was unhurt, thanks to exceptional police
work. I could also hear those shots from my house.
In spite of the many, many guns that I see being carried by
normal citizens, and in spite of the exponentially larger
quantity of guns that I know people around here own, we
don't have a violence problem. There are no bars on the
windows, no blaring sirens in the night. I let my kids walk
to the library, and I walk to church from time to time. I've
never felt unsafe, at any time of the day or night, on the
streets of my town.
The violence that we do have comes from drugs and other
social issues, and is almost always from the outside world
coming in. Uninterestingly and unsurprisingly, in both of
the cases that I mentioned above, the individuals in
question were not legally permitted to have firearms at all,
because of their prior convictions. The law, it seems, does
not apply to the lawless.
Of course, guns are a hot political issue, for some reason.
I don't see anything political about them myself, except for
the fact that an unarmed populous is much easier to subdue.
It's easy enough to see the benefit, from a government's
perspective, of vilifying and regulating guns. Of course,
those topics aren't generally broached when talking about
guns and the law. Instead, people tend toward divisive
thought and behavior, blatant ignorance, manipulative data
interpretations, et. al. Read any modern "gun control" news
piece for a heated, logic-free debacle on the subject.
I got my Astragalus, and then went to Wal-Mart for a few
other items. I didn't see anyone else carrying a gun, but I
wasn't really thinking about it. Hopefully I haven't
offended anyone too much in this post, either with my
penchant for herbalism, or with my position on guns. In the
end, I don't control other people and their feelings, so I
have to focus on taking care of and controlling myself.
